


Laughter in the Dark

by theadventuresof



Category: Death Note
Genre: Canon Divergence, M/M, Other, Yotsuba Arc, certain characters do not die thank you very much, destroy the notebook or light dies
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-28
Updated: 2017-02-19
Packaged: 2018-04-11 16:11:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 26,917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4442438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theadventuresof/pseuds/theadventuresof
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Light Yagami can't be Kira. So why does something in his brain keep trying to convince him otherwise?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

_The darkness drops again but now I know_

_That twenty centuries of stony sleep_

_Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,_

_And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,_

_Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?_

_—William Butler Yeats_

* * *

NOVEMBER

Pale sky, just before daybreak. One solitary star shivered against the firmament. A fog was rolling in over Winchester, kissing the iron-tipped gates of an ancient orphanage that loomed out of the predawn half-light like some peculiar fortress. Smoke curled from the main chimney, and artifacts were scattered across the dying lawn—pairs of old boots, a worn wooden rocking horse, an ancient pith helmet, an abandoned chessboard.

Just as the last trembling star faded away, a dim lamp blinked on in the farthest second-story window from the orphanage gate. Quick as a shadow, a silhouette passed across the lit panes and disappeared, taking away the light as it went.

The silhouette was one of a slender child, who now began making his way down a long, narrow hall, torch in hand. One small blond head peeked around the railing of a grand staircase, and a boy crawled silently across the oriental rug and nimbly descended the curved stairs like a cat. He looked both ways as he reached the landing, and, once he was sure that the coast was clear, slipped into the study at the end of the hall, closing the door behind him.

It felt precisely like Christmas morning. He simply couldn’t sit still in the dark anymore.

Panting somewhat, Mello shrugged his jacket from his shoulders and set it on the table before him as he surveyed the gradually brightening room. There was a grand mahogany wardrobe against the back wall, which stood next to a grandfather clock whose front panel was frosted with a generous layer of cobwebs. His favorite part of the room, a small gap in the row of bookshelves, formed a snug alcove in which to read in peace away from the sepulchral silence of the main library. Mello drew up a chair in this alcove and crouched in it, tapping his foot against the shelf. In just over two hours, L would be walking through that door, and Mello would run to him and leap into his outstretched arms and breathe in his familiar spun-sugar scent...what did it matter that he couldn’t stay long, that he would only be visiting for a few hours...L was coming, and Mello was going to see him.

A grin spread across his face, and, finding himself suddenly bursting with energy, Mello leapt out of his chair, dashed to the little window above the reading nook, and climbed a shelf to get a better view. It was a lovely, clear morning, and Winchester was silver in the dawn light. Mello peered across the moor and watched a fine mist rise out of the heather. The silver light was rapidly turning gray and wooly clouds were gliding in over the faraway hills—but no matter, no matter; L liked the rain, liked to stand out beyond the porch and feel it on his skin, and Mello loved to watch the rain with him...

Mello made himself comfortable, curling up against the bookshelf, and waited. He had to be ready. He had to be first.

An hour passed in relative silence. The grandfather clock lulled him into a bit of a daze, but he refused to close his eyes...

 _I’m in between cases,_ L had said over the phone, whose line had been encrypted thrice over, so there was no need for the voice filter. _I’ll be able to visit for a weekend, at least, unless something comes up unexpectedly, but I doubt that will happen..._

 _Don’t tempt fate,_ Mello had said back, and they both had laughed, knowing that nothing would happen anyway. Mello loved when L visited between cases; his mind was never preoccupied with victim reports and autopsies and lab analyses and databases...and he himself had finished his coursework early to make sure they would have enough time to see each other properly; no need for multiverse theory and Arabic and forensic psychology to get in the way either. Just L and Mello. Two orphans. Two—friends, was that the word? Did L consider him a friend? Could he?

The rain started around breakfast time, but Mello stayed huddled against his bookshelf, hugging his knees to his chest. He would eat when L arrived...

Mello shivered. The glass was cold...the rain had cast a spell on him, and he felt his eyes sliding closed...he hadn’t slept last night from sheer excitement; he had crouched in the dark, waiting, waiting...

Muffled footsteps and scraping chairs...he thought he heard two people come in, take a book off one of the lower shelves, and leave...they must have not seen him, curled up in his alcove...

The sky grew darker and wilder, and bruised stratus clouds crawled along the moor, spitting rain as they went. Midday came and went, and Mello was fast asleep, his thin chest rising and falling in time to the gentle patter of the rain against the window. Afternoon slipped away...Mello stirred but didn’t wake as thunder shook the orphanage, rattling his window pane...

It was November fifth, bonfire night.

The sun set in a blaze of violet through the rain, and scarlet bled into the horizon from the west, a deep velvet curtain upon which a thousand and one fireworks shattered into multitudes of stars—great dazzling blue ones that faded to gold as they burst, long silver ones that trailed sparks like miniature comets, blue and red and green ones that exploded like glittering pinwheels and left twisted smoke skeletons hanging in the sky.

Mello slept on.

* * *

He woke up in the dark, nestled comfortably in his own bed, but severely mystified. The sheets were cool against his cheek and he was still in his clothes. Someone had moved him, and removed his socks and shoes...he licked his dry lips, blinking dazedly in the darkness...what time was it? Would L be here soon? Footsteps came and went in the hall. Waiting...waiting. The door to the room was closed...something was wrong...he sat up and smacked his head against the bottom of Matt’s bunk.

His door creaked open and butter-yellow light spilled across the carpet. A tentative figure peered around the frame. Disoriented, rubbing the blinking lights from his eyes, Mello squinted.

“Matt?” Mello croaked, then slumped against the pillow in relief as he recognized his best friend’s silhouette.

Matt stepped into the room carefully, his hair lit up from behind. “Hey,” he said, out of breath somewhat. He was still getting over a bout of the flu.

Mello wasted no time. “Is L here?” he said. “Is he late? When is he coming?”

Matt, midway through hanging his coat on the bunk, hesitated. Mello’s face fell. He knew.

“I’m sorry, Mels,” Matt said softly, placing one hand on Mello’s shoulder. “You just missed him.”

Mello slumped against the bedframe dejectedly, too shocked to even consider crying. He suddenly felt very hollow. All day...and all of the previous night...he couldn’t do it...L had come and gone, and he hadn’t stopped to give him the time of day.

“I can’t believe—I can’t believe—” Mello began. It was all he seemed capable of saying.

“He said he wanted to see you. He said he was really sorry, but his flight got delayed, and he had to get back to the airport as soon as he could—he was on his way out the door...”

“Sure he was,” Mello said. Now he was crying, and he hated the way his voice quavered. “You’re too—too _nice,_ Matt. That’s your problem. Tell the truth, will you? He didn’t want to see me. You got to see him. Why didn’t you wake me up?”

“I—” Matt started to say, but Mello cut him off.

“He doesn’t care,” he said, relapsing into a fresh bout of tears. “He never has...he never cared about me...”

“Mello, you’re going to have to trust me!” Matt said, now rather frantic. “Believe me, he said he was sorry! And—and look,” he said, brandishing an envelope in Mello’s face, “He said to give you this...”

Mello snatched it from Matt’s hands and ripped it open, wiping his nose on the back of his hand as he did so.

 _Dear Mello,_ he read, recognizing L’s familiar, crabbed handwriting, and now an anguished sob tore from Mello’s throat and tears sprang to his eyes, blurring the rest of the note. He curled his fist around the paper, shaking with anger and desolation. All day, and all night...damn his tiny body for betraying him, for keeping him away from the waking world for so long...Matt reached for his shoulder once more, but hesitated. Mello opened his fist, stared for a split second at the crumpled letter, and then, as if following orders, doggedly tore it into pieces and scattered them across the carpet.

“Mels...” said Matt timidly. Mello sniffed.

“Did Near get to see him?”

“What?”

“Did...” Mello paused. He suddenly felt extraordinarily petty, but no matter. He plunged ahead anyway. “Did Near get to see him?”

Matt shook his head in the darkness. “Nobody did. I wasn’t supposed to. I was on my way to the kitchens to sneak a toffee apple back, and I ran into him and Roger in the hall...”

Mello’s face visibly brightened. L, who didn’t have time to see anyone during this visit, had left him, of all people, a letter...

And he had torn it up. He hid his head in his arms again.

“He hates me,” Mello said bleakly. “I tore it up...I tore it up...”

“Mello...” Matt began. “You needed the rest. Don’t—don’t beat yourself up.”

"You know," Mello sniffed. "I haven't seen him in so long...it's as if he's just another character in one of our stupid stories...it's as if he's not even _real,_ Matt—"

A particularly loud firework went off without warning, startling Mello so badly that he stopped crying in shock. At once both boys found themselves laughing uncontrollably, collapsing against the edge of Mello’s bunk.

Matt scrubbed at his eyes and gave a ferocious yawn. “It’s almost midnight,” he said. “You slept for nearly twelve hours.”

Mello gave him a watery smile. “I was awake for almost twenty-four.”

They watched the fireworks in silence for a while, and listened to the rain singing on the moor. Mello briefly leaned his head against Matt’s shoulder, but quickly took it off, remembering that Matt was still sick with the flu.

“Matt?” said Mello abruptly.

“Mmm?”

“Sorry for snapping at you,” Mello said in a small voice, frustrated to find himself fighting back tears once more. “I...I didn’t mean to get angry like that; I just...”

Matt turned to him, and smiled in the glow from the fireworks. “It’s okay, Mels,” he said, yawning widely once more. “Time for bed for me, I think.”

“All right,” Mello whispered, and curled up like a cat as Matt climbed up to his bunk. “Good night.”

“Good night, Mels.”

Rain whispered against Mello's window, carving paths like tear tracks across the glass. A deep booming roll echoed across the moor, but whether it was from the fireworks or thunder, Mello didn’t know. He could hear Matt quietly clearing his throat above him, and he rolled over in his own bed, oddly comforted by the sound. At long last, as he closed his eyes and let the night wash over him, the ghost of one last firework faded from the sky. Bonfire night was over.

Eighteen days later, halfway across the world, a brilliant young student named Light Yagami picked up a black notebook.


	2. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Where is L, anyway?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm very fond of William Butler Yeats. (The next chapter will have an intro quote from someone else.)  
> Light's experiences in this chapter are based on my own dealings with obsessive compulsive disorder. Be warned; the last sequence is a bit graphic and could be triggering.  
> I wrote this while listening to the shrek 2 soundtrack. Um... yes.

* * *

 

 _Too long a sacrifice_  
_Can make a stone of the heart._  
_O when may it suffice?_  
_That is heaven's part, our part_  
_To murmur name upon name,_  
_As a mother names her child_  
_When sleep at last has come_  
_On limbs that had run wild._  
_What is it but nightfall?_  
_No, no, not night but death._  
_Was it needless death after all?_

_—William Butler Yeats, Easter 1916_

* * *

 

SEVEN MONTHS LATER

Light Yagami had not asked for this.

He wasn’t sure what to call it—not a voice, exactly. Just a tugging sensation in the corner of his mind, a feeling that he was forgetting something vitally important to do with the Kira case— something that could cost him his life.

As far as he was concerned, there was no more stressful feeling in the world. An itch he was unable to scratch, a blind spot that jumped around the more he tried to focus—it disappeared like a rainbow as he approached, always maddeningly out of reach. He might have been standing on some riverbank, reaching out over the rushing water and straining for the fruit-laden branch of an apple tree on the other side—a globe of truth just out of reach, each one a glistening bubble, round and perfect and scarlet and sweet—but the more he reached, the more the current threatened to sweep him under, carry him away forever...

_ I’m not Kira,  _ he told himself every morning, before he had even opened his eyes. He’d be lying supine, tangled in his sheets with L hunched at his laptop to his left, and he’d think it to himself as if he was casting a spell.  _ I’m not Kira, I’m not Kira.  _ Thrice, for luck. After several weeks, thrice a morning simply wasn’t enough.  _ I’m not Kira, I’m not Kira, I’m not Kira, I’m not Kira.  _ The more he repeated it in his mind, the less it meant.

He could sweep it under the rug, for a little while, at least. But it always managed to surface again. There was simply no way to turn it off.

_ I’m not Kira,  _ Light thought once more. Blood throbbed in his ears, and a zigzag of lightning snapped through his brain.  _ Be rational. I know I’m not Kira. I would know if I was Kira, and I’m not him. I can’t be.  _ It hurt to think too much about the possibility of being Kira, though he couldn’t explain why. Even venturing into that territory of his mind was difficult. He ended up going in circles and getting painfully, dizzyingly lost. Perhaps, Light thought, it was because L never seemed to believe him.

_ He suspects me,  _ said Light’s brain, unbidden.  _ He’s never been wrong before.  _ Light’s heart raced at the thought and he went cold with dread.  _ I’m telling the truth! He must be wrong.  _ Panic cut at his chest. He longed to not be Kira—not just for his own sake but for L’s as well. For  _ everyone’s  _ sake.

After all, with his intelligence and his discontent with the state of Japan’s justice system, he would make an excellent Kira—the  _ perfect  _ Kira. That was what terrified him more than anything.

“...and Mogi’s been working overtime since the weekend; it’s about time for him to take a break,” came a low voice from somewhere to Light’s left.

Something—something smelled  _ fantastically  _ good.

Light stirred. He felt exceptionally warm and comfortable, however tainted the morning was with remnants of his dream. He thought he might have been imagining the scent of jasmine and mint... a faint wave of vanilla wafted across his face and he rolled over onto his side, only to feel something sharp jab into his wrist, pinching his skin. Light yelped.

“Are you quite all right, Light?” said the same voice, now with a note of concern. Light opened his eyes.  _ I’m not Kira. _

“I’m not Kira,” he blurted, without thinking. He blinked up at his companion dazedly. The dark, prominent eyes and narrow colorless face of L, alias Ryuzaki, swam into focus before him. The detective had one phone in his hand and another phone on the bed next to him.

L looked vaguely amused, continuing to survey him closely as he felt around on the nightstand for a long-abandoned cup of coffee. “You seem very desperate to affirm so,” he said, locating the cup and taking a long, sputtering sip. He adjusted the phone against his ear. The detective’s wild black hair grazed his forehead like an unruly wreath and Light fought a sudden crazy urge to brush it out of his eyes for him. Light rubbed the tiredness from his own eyes and ran one hand across the back of his head, suddenly acutely self-conscious of the morning humidity’s effect on his carefully maintained hair.

“That’s fine,” said L into his phone, just as the other phone rang. “One moment, please, Chief, I must take this...”

Light, rubbing at the spot where the handcuff had cut into his wrist, watched L answer the other phone. Words seemed to be taking an awfully long time to make sense this morning.

_ “Yes, second shelf to the right in the screening room,”  _ said L in an—odd voice. English. Light felt as if his entire brain was tying itself in a knot in concentration. L switched phones, tucking one between his shoulder and his ear, and motioned at Light to fetch him a pen.  _ “Just a moment.  _ Thank you, Chief. Please, take the day off. Your health takes top priority.” He switched phones again, scribbling furiously at a scrap of paper.  _ “How many minutes? All right—”  _ He crossed something out on his scrap of paper.  _ “Take a breath and listen to me. You’ve got to cut the wires. There should be three on the front panel—yes. Primer, then reactor, then ignition timer. Don’t go out of order, or you will set it off. Of course. You’re very welcome.” _

L set down his phone, retrieved a small square case from the nightstand, opened it up, and began to liberally apply pale foundation to his already pallid face.

“Your father is ill, Light,” said the detective, looking more and more like a corpse as he went. “Nothing life-threatening, but he says he’s not able to work.”

Frowning, Light nodded, nettled that L had received the news about his father before he had.

“About your earlier outburst,” L said, replacing his foundation case on the nightstand, “I must ask, were you dreaming about a scenario in which you were Kira, or—?”

Light hunched over in bed, his arms crossed tightly across his chest. “It just slipped out,” he said with gritted teeth. “But I was telling the truth.”

“Of course you were,” said L absentmindedly, now painting black crescents underneath his eyes with clinical finesse.

“Besides," Light said, "you told me yourself that I wasn’t murdering people in my sleep.”

L turned to him, his eyes now ringed completely in black, and raised a nonexistent eyebrow. In the weak sunlight from the window, his skin had an odd green tint. L looked deader than usual today. “So I did,” he said.

Light shivered. 

“What is it?” said L.

Light cast around for an appropriate answer. “I miss college,” he offered lamely. “This has been a strange year. For—many reasons.”

L was watching him with a curious expression. “Light,” he said, “if this helps at all—” 

“Knowing you, I doubt it will—”

L twisted the chain around his index finger. “I didn’t got to college either, Light, and—” 

"Yes,” Light said, “But what does it matter, since you know all of the material already.” 

“So do you.”

Light’s frown deepened and he looked away. “Oh, god, Ryug—Ryuz—whoever you are. It’s not the content at all, it’s the atmosphere—it’s the routine; it’s the comfort of knowing exactly what’s coming weeks in advance.” He sighed and leaned back against his pillows, closing his eyes. The chain jingled. “I never thought I’d say this, but I miss doing the same thing every day. I miss having no conviction, and doing well in school for the sake of doing well. I’m too invested in this case. It’s giving me nightmares.”

L looked at him sharply. A jolt of understanding passed between the two detectives, and Light was suddenly very sure that he wasn’t the only one with that particular problem.

“I know,” L said, staring at him with those fathomless eyes. For what felt like a whole minute, neither of them seemed able to look away from each other.

“I—never mind all that,” Light said at last, tearing his eyes away from L’s and sliding out of bed. “Let’s go downstairs. I want to get to work.”

He stooped to put on his socks and shoes (regrettably, he had been sleeping in his clothes recently for convenience) and turned to coordinate his movements with L’s as to avoid getting tangled in the curtain pulls. L stood up from his nest of quilts as Light edged carefully around the bed and headed for the elevator door.

Met with unexpected resistance from L’s end of the chain, Light turned around in confusion. L was still standing on the edge of the bed, a greenish pallor edging over his face.

“Er—Ryuzaki?” Light ventured. “What’re you doing?”

“I’m—” said L, his voice wan. He swallowed. “I’m seeing spots.”

The detective wobbled dangerously on his feet. Light realized what was about to happen seconds before it did, and lunged forwards to catch L, whose knees buckled beneath him. As he fell, the chain caught around Light’s opposite wrist, and, hopelessly tangled together, the pair collapsed against the bed again. L gasped in pain; Light had flung his arm over his trachea. Hurriedly, Light extricated himself from L as best he could and knelt over him tentatively.

“Shit,” Light breathed, feeling L’s forehead, then his pulse. “Are you okay?”

“Feet elevated,” L said weakly. “Call Watari...here...” He thrust his phone into Light’s hands. Light fumbled with the phone for several seconds, dialed Watari, and held it up to his ear.

“Yes, Ryuzaki? What is it?” came Watari’s voice from the end of the line.

“Er, hello—” Light said, unsure how to continue. What was he supposed to call him—‘sir?’ Just ‘Watari’? He skipped straight to the point. “It’s me, it’s Light, and Ryuzaki’s just collapsed; he’s not well—he’s still conscious, though...”

“Oh, dear,” Watari said with a small sigh, “First Chief Yagami and now Ryuzaki...I’m on my way; stay where you are. He’ll be fine. If he has what the Chief has got, it’s just a mild bout of the flu.”

L looked anything but fine; he was now shivering pathetically and his complexion had gone from white to a delicate gray. Light set the phone down and arranged several pillows beneath his feet to encourage bloodflow to his head. His eyes were open, but barely.

“You scared me,” Light said, his heart pounding. Something behind his navel fluttered.  _ Perfect.  _ L blinked up at him slowly. “I scared myself,” he breathed. “I haven't fallen ill in ages...”

“Lack of sleep takes a toll on your immune system.”

L rolled his eyes as best he could. “Thank you, Physiology 101.”

Light smirked. “See? College pays off.”

L actually smiled at him then, his huge eyes sliding closed. It was a nice smile, Light thought. Shame about the circumstances.

“Light,” L whispered. “I need a favor. I need you to be L for the day...I need you to run the case...”

There it was again, an odd swooping feeling in the pit of his stomach.  _ Perfect.  _ This was  _ exactly  _ what he needed to happen. L was incapacitated. It was the perfect time to begin.

Light blinked and shook his head, unsure where that particular string of thoughts had come from. “Er—of course, Ryuzaki,” he said, still somewhat frantic. The elevator doors slid open and Watari emerged with a metal briefcase in one hand and a stethoscope around his neck.

“Good morning, both of you,” he said. L turned his head towards the elevators weakly, looking more corpselike than ever. “Let’s assess the damage, shall we?”

Nineteen hours later, under Light's direction, the case had made its most progress in months.

* * *

“So Kira is definitely connected with the Yotsuba group in some way.”

_ “Yes,  _ L, now finish this spoonful and go to sleep. God knows you need it.”

_ “Ryuzaki,  _ Light. And I’ve tried,” said L unconvincingly, typing away at his laptop with great fervor. He pulled the covers up higher, shivering. Light smirked at him.

“What, afraid you won’t wake up?”

“Well—yes.”

There was that damned flutter again. He hadn't expected such candidness.

“I hate to tell you,” said Light, “but it hardly matters whether you’re afraid or not. People die.”

L sighed and closed his eyes. “I can think of about five hundred people off the top of my head who actively want me dead,” he said. “And the first one on the list is sitting right next to me, spoon-feeding me broth and running my investigation.”

“Oh, shut up,” Light snapped, jerking the spoon away from L's mouth. “Tell me I’m not Kira.”

L smiled wanly. “I can’t do both,” he said, curling up under his quilt with his laptop on top of his chest for warmth. Light scrubbed at his eyes and yawned. 

“Just go to sleep,” said Light halfheartedly. “You need it.”

Light closed his own eyes and felt L moving around under the quilt. There was that fantastic aroma from earlier, a heavenly combination of jasmine and mint and vanilla— _ oh. _

It was L’s hair. Light found himself inhaling deeply through his nose. Strands of jet-black hair fluttered against his face. He was shocked at how soft it was. Did he use a product on it, or was that just how it smelled?  _ That was an odd thing to think,  _ Light thought. And then an even stranger one:  _ I wouldn’t mind if he kissed me. _

“I’m sorry, Light,” said L quietly amidst the humming of his laptop. He snapped it shut and the blue light vanished, dousing them in darkness. Tokyo glittered outside the window.

Light rolled over and gave him a lopsided grin. “Will you be apologizing from most to least serious offense, or will you be going in chronological order?”

L started. “I thought you were asleep.”

“And you  _ should  _ be asleep,” Light said. “Bastard.”

Light glimpsed the faintest trace of a smile on L’s pale lips before he closed his eyes. He wanted to touch L’s hair again.

* * *

Light had never felt so alive. His hands closed in on L’s neck and he seized the pale skin. L gasped but didn’t protest— _ couldn't  _ protest; Light had cut off his windpipe—he was turning purple, scrabbling for purchase against Light’s fingers, but as Light gave one final squeeze the detective went limp, and Light felt a surge of accomplishment and satisfaction. This was right. This was right. L was dead.  _ I’ve done it,  _ Light said in his dream, and seconds later woke up with a jolt of dread.

Something was wrong; the room was different. The window was gone. Light groped for a light in the darkness, touched something milky white and ice cold, and recoiled.

There, curled up to Light’s left and clearly dead, was L.

A scream bubbled up in Light’s throat and he clapped a hand to his mouth and scrambled out of bed, jerking the chain with him. L’s hand flopped pointlessly against his pillow. Violet finger marks danced at his neck, turning from red to black to glowing green. His face was blue. Asphyxiation.

Light fought the nausea building in the pit of his stomach and clamped both hands over his mouth.

_ Chained to a dead man—chained to a dead man—I didn’t—I’m not Kira, I’m not Kira, I’m not Kira, I’m not Kira— _

“I’m not Kira,” he whispered, as if he could undo death. “I’m not Kira. I’m not Kira. I’m not—”

_ Perfect. _

L’s eye sockets were sinking, blood pooling behind his ears and above his cheeks...his fingernails were coming loose, and mottled purple and gray crept over his skin, a thousand phantom blowflies pouring from his weeping dead eyes as the whole room buzzed like television static...

_ Perfect perfect perfect perfect perfect— _

“Stop,” said Light aloud, his voice shaking.  _ “Stop!” _

L’s eyes flew open. The bruises around his neck were gone. Light blinked in shock, breathing as if he had just run a marathon, and fell to his knees against the bed, weak with terror.

“Whassgoingon?” L croaked, undeniably alive. Moonlight streamed in through the window. Light choked on a mouthful of air. Relief flooded him. His face was cold; his fingertips were exceedingly hot.

“I saw you dead,” Light breathed. “I saw—you were dead, I—” He rubbed his eyes frantically. “I could have sworn—”

“Nightmare,” L muttered, and rolled over, instantly asleep. Light watched his thin chest rise and fall as if in a trance. He shivered. It had felt real, for a moment. And—more worryingly—it had felt  _ right,  _ seeing L dead.

He shook the thought away and climbed into bed once more.

“I’m not Kira,” he said under his breath, and repeated it in his head until sleep claimed him. He was awake for a long time.


	3. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A wild B appears…! But only in passing. Also, why was there a tiny piece of paper in Light Yagami’s expensive watch?

_The cradle rocks above an abyss, and common sense tells us that our existence is but a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness._

_—Vladimir Nabokov_

* * *

WINCHESTER

There was a little overgrown graveyard across from Wammy’s house, a tiny sunkissed glade with ancient chipped slate stones and broken branches strewn throughout. Starlings and magpies congregated to the tangle of foliage along the kissing-gate and built nests in the buckthorn and the juniper and the white roses and the dogwood. The most magnificent tree of all was a fantastically gnarled willow whose branches trailed along the mossy ground, and it was behind the curtains of willow leaves where Matt and Mello met up before class, to smoke stolen cigarettes and watch the world go by.

Winchester glowed golden green in the newborn morning sunlight and a lovely fresh dew lay across the orphanage lawn. Matt raced up from the strawberry patch, crossed the street with nary a second glance, and climbed down past the culvert to the shroud of willow leaves. Mello emerged from behind the greenery, tucking a stack of notebooks into his bookbag. Classes ran year-round at the orphanage, though Matt and Mello both had only one morning class today.

“You ever consider that those things are making your constant head colds worse?” Mello said by way of morning greeting, as Matt lit a cigarette and puffed on it with only a minor coughing fit.

“Whatever, Mels,” Matt said good-naturedly, leaning against the willow bark lazily. He sighed. “It’s too nice out to go to class, don’t you think?”

“Easy for you to say,” Mello said. “I can’t miss another lecture. Goddamn Roger, dragging me out of Latin last Monday just to get me to sign those release papers...”

“Oh, come off it, Mels,” Matt said with a grin. “You know everything already. Lighten up sometime. It’ll do you some good.”

“Not while I’ve got a reputation to uphold,” Mello muttered, tracing the buckle on his bookbag with two fingers. He looked up at a small robin flitting about in the upper branches of the willow. At a spot slightly above his head, carved jaggedly into the bark, was the now-faded message, underlined with two quick slashes:

_B+A_

Matt was reading the engraving too. They had both seen it many times before, but now Mello knew what it meant.

“He told me about B,” Mello said, unable to look away from the tree. “Last time he was here.”

Matt jumped down into the culvert, dangling his legs over the edge. “Wasn’t he with the first generation?”

“He was like us,” Mello said. “A replacement for L. And then—and then A died, and he ran away from the orphanage.”

Matt tore up a fistful of grass.

 _“He_ couldn’t get L’s attention either,” Mello said vindictively. “Until he committed three murders and attempted a fourth.”

Matt looked up in shock. “I never heard that part.”

“It makes me wonder, sometimes,” Mello said, “if the only way to get L’s attention is to become his mortal enemy. It’s as if he only really cares about solving his cases, and nothing else.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Matt said. “Of course he cares about _us._ We’re practically his wards.”

Mello scoffed. “I bet he cares more about Kira than both of us combined. Seriously, since when has he taken over seven months to solve a case? Something’s funny about this one.”

“Well,” Matt said. “What can we do?”

Mello pursed his lips. He glanced up at the engraved bark again.

“Don’t you dare run away from here and start offing people to get him to pay attention to you,” Matt said. “Or, if you do, bring me with you. I wouldn’t want to miss out on that.”

Mello smiled and leaned back against the tree once more. Matt, searching for a new cigarette, suddenly stopped with a small surprised noise.

“Hey, Mels. Look at this,” Matt said, and reached down into the culvert.

“What?”

Matt emerged with a pristine bottle of wine, only a quarter of the way empty. “Who would chuck this?” he said.

Mello inspected the bottle. Its label was faded to gray, but it looked terribly expensive. “I don’t know,” he said.

“Let’s bring it back to the room before class,” Matt said, a mischievous grin sneaking across his face. “We can save it for tonight.”

“Wait,” Mello said. “Let me try something.” He took the bottle by the neck, estimating its weight, and swung it back and forth once, twice, three times, before swinging it up above his head with an almighty effort. Matt watched the bottle’s progress, open-mouthed, expecting it to complete its orbit without interruption—but halfway through, Mello’s bony arm trembled horribly, and he held the bottle upside down in midair, directly above his head. With a _glup-glup-glup_ sort of noise, the upended bottle’s contents spilled like some deep crimson waterfall directly onto Mello’s head.

Matt quickly stifled a laugh, realizing one of several problems. Mello was sputtering and coughing; he dropped the now-empty bottle into the street, where it shattered against the culvert with a piercing crash. His usually blond hair was now a dirty puce, and his clothes were soaked through and emitting painfully strong alcoholic fumes. Matt gagged, and offered Mello a handkerchief, with which he vainly tried to wipe his bookbag clean.

“Why did you do that?” Matt choked. “Waste of good wine!”

Mello spat a violet gob of saliva into the culvert. “I thought I could do it,” he muttered. The orphanage bells began to toll.

“Shit,” Matt hissed. “Latin! You smell like a brewery, Mels. Well done.”

Mello groaned. “I can’t be late again,” he said, wringing out his now purple sweater and attempting to dry his hair with it. He felt a bit woozy from the smell.

“I suppose we can’t drink it tonight,” Matt said as they took off across the street and through the lawn to class. “Really excellent work, Mels. Maybe L will stop by to congratulate you.”

Mello kicked at his shins as they hurried across the front porch.

* * *

“I can’t believe she actually made me leave,” Mello hissed, just over an hour later, as they climbed the spiral stairs to their shared bedroom. “I missed another class. I hate this, Matt. It was just a bit of wine.”

“She thought you were intoxicated,” Matt said. “Of course she had you leave. Besides, it was only a review session. It’s not as if you missed anything vital.”

“It’s not the material,” Mello said under his breath. “It’s—oh, speak of the devil. There he is.”

Matt peered across the landing into an abandoned second-floor classroom. Inside, at the very back of the room, was a solitary figure with pale skin and floating clouds of white hair. He was perched on the teacher’s desk, reading a tiny black book and humming to himself ever so softly.

“When did you start caring what Near thinks of you?” Matt whispered. Near looked up from his book.

“Time to go,” Mello decided, turning away from the classroom and frog-marching Matt down the hall.

“Mello,” Near called, in a small voice. Mello jerked around, groaning internally. “What?” he said.

“That was quite an entrance you made,” Near said, smirking. “Are you so desperate for attention that you resort to dousing yourself in spirits before class? What’s next, actually showing up and doing the work?”

“Fuck you,” Mello spat. “What do you actually want?”

Near sighed, and looked away from the door. He flipped through the pages of his tiny book, staring intently.

“I have a question,” he said at last, twisting a curl of white hair between two fingers.

Mello scoffed. “Why ask for my take, O enlightened one?”

Near shrugged, curls bouncing against the collar of his jumper. “I need a change of perspective,” he said. “What—what kind of person do you think Kira is?”

Mello was caught off guard by the uncertainty in Near’s voice. He leaned against Near’s desk, frowning intensely. A fleeting image of a tall, faceless man in a pristine suit flashed through his mind.

“I don’t know,” he said at last, “but I hope L kicks his ass.”

* * *

TOKYO

Light Yagami sneezed and attempted to stop himself from sneezing at the same time, resulting in an ungainly sniffing noise.

“Gesundheit,” said L, stepping into the elevator.

“What?”

“German,” L said. “Sorry.” He tapped perseveringly on the handcuff chain, making Light’s wrist vibrate as the elevator began to move. It was the end of the workday, and the investigation had made a modest amount of progress, honing in on the Yotsuba Group’s activities and pinpointing Kira’s location. Light was now truly beginning to realize what a thrill it was to work alongside L, who, motivation properly restored, lived up to his title entirely, making up for his month-long hiatus in a matter of days. Light now began to truly appreciate L’s genius, his perspective, his perfect intuition, even if it came with side effects like the odd posture and the constant trips to the kitchen and the _tapping_ —

“Ryuzaki,” Light said, but decided mid-speech not to continue. Knowing L, it was probably just another test. He had had quite enough of those of late.

Light shivered. _From one murderer to another, I’ll see you in hell,_ his father said, and Light stared down the barrel of the gun, numb with shock, colors flashing through his mind—

Light groaned inwardly, tried to push the thought from his brain. A blinding light, a sound like a thousand cannons, a trail of blue smoke, and a sunset as scarlet as the blood on the street after that busjacker had gotten run over right before his eyes; it was as if death was following right behind him—

Shuddering, Light came back to reality, and realized that L was talking to him.

“...bringing some old friends in at the end of the week,” L said, tapping away on the chain.

Light nodded vaguely, then frowned as the words sunk in. “Wait a moment,” he said. “Didn’t you say that I was your first ever friend?”

L looked at him. “Well, yes,” he said. “I was just trying to incite some sort of reaction. I _do_ have a life outside of you, Light, believe it or not. And in reality they’re more...acquaintances than friends.”

Light, simultaneously insulted and intrigued, plowed ahead. “Thanks a lot,” he said. “Tell me about these—acquaintances of yours.”

“Con artists,” L said. “The best thieves I’ve ever known, and the most honorable. They’ll be here by the end of the week, if all goes well.”

Light frowned again. “You’re sure that’s a good idea? They _are_ thieves.”

L sighed a long-suffering sigh. “Light, I’m chained twenty-four hours a day to a serial killer intent on eliminating me from the face of the earth and stealing my identity, and you of all people are worried about me bringing a few _thieves_ in?”

Light groaned and cast a despairing glance at the elevator ceiling. “Not this again,” he said tiredly. “I don’t know how much more of these false accusations I can take. How can you say it so matter-of-factly?”

“I can say it matter-of-factly because it is, in fact, a matter of fact,” L said nonchalantly.

“You are not helping me,” Light said. “And—that tapping isn’t helping either.”

L kept tapping.

“There’s another percentage point, I’m afraid.”

Light rolled his eyes with such vigor that he was afraid for a fleeting moment that they would get stuck facing backwards into his skull. “I understand. I don’t like the finger tapping and therefore I’m Kira. I need a haircut and therefore I’m Kira. I’m wearing—” he gathered up a handful of his sweater— “blue today and therefore I’m Kira. I _get_ it, L.”

“Ryuzaki,” L corrected, as they arrived on the correct floor. “Light, listen.”

 _“No,”_ Light said, more harshly than he had expected. His voice came out low and desperate. “You listen to me. I’m not Kira, I swear on my life. But every time you even suggest that I might be him, I have to convince myself all over again from scratch. I’m—I’m so _tired,_ L. You try having your best friend accuse you of mass murder every other minute for weeks on end and come out unscathed. I hate this, L, I hate this—and the nightmares and the horrible feelings and—I _know_ I’m not Kira, L; you’ve got to believe me.”

“You _are_ Kira,” L said as the elevator doors slid open, depositing them at their room. “Or you were, and you’ve orchestrated things so that you’ve forgotten. That’s the only possible solution.”

“You’re wrong.”

“I’m never wrong.”

It wasn’t a boast; it was simply a statement of fact. Light looked L straight in the eye; then, as if following orders, he drew his fist back and punched him in the nose. L went down, grabbing the chain close to Light’s wrist as he did, and Light slid headfirst out of the elevator, off balance.

“Please don’t do this,” L said from the floor, still remarkably calm. “I’d hate to raise your percentage again.”

 _“Stop!”_ Light screamed. “Don’t you _dare_ make me question my innocence again, L, I swear I’ll—”

“Tell me, Kira,” L whispered breathlessly. He sounded—strangely _elated._ Light stared at his face, at the anticipation and malice sparkling unmistakably in his normally dead-looking eyes. He watched his chest heaving, watched a smirk tug at the corner of his pale lips, and, blinded by fury, he raised his fist again, wanting nothing more than to make him suffer, make him feel pain—

“You—make—me—feel—like—I’m— _drowning,”_ Light gasped, each word punctuated with a hit. “Why can’t you just believe me? _Can’t you see I’m telling the truth?”_

The last word tore from Light’s throat and hung there in the air between them, heavy and thick and sour. Light prepared to throw another punch, but L seized Light’s fist as it hurtled towards his face and twisted Light’s arm until he cried out and rolled sideways across the floor, tangled in the curtain pulls at the foot of the bed.

“That’s quite enough, Light Yagami,” L breathed, pushing himself to his feet. Never before had Light been able to fully appreciate how _feared_ L truly was. The man before him was not his companion Ryuga, or his fellow detective Ryuzaki. Gone was the slouching oddball with a spoon hanging halfway out of his mouth and his head tilted blithely to one side. This L towered over Light as he struggled to stand again, powerful and terrible and dark and proud. He looked frightening, mad, deranged; his black eyes glittered coldly, and wisps of black hair flashed across his face like some unearthly shroud. This was what L’s enemies would have seen, had he decided to show them his face. Light shivered as he got to his feet, still trembling from the impact, and met L’s gaze with difficulty. It was like staring down an owl.

The phone rang from the nightstand, causing L to turn, and Light seized his chance. He yanked his end of the chain out of L’s hands and scrambled from his position on the floor to atop the bed, then flung himself at the detective with a strangled yell. L hit the floor hard, but immediately dropped into a crouch and slid nimbly around Light, who skidded against the rug and came to a halt against the wall, his knees and palms stinging horribly. The chain twitched and Light felt himself being jerked in L’s direction once more, and he regained his footing and threw one, two punches; heard the satisfying smack of his fist colliding with L’s cheek—

L flew backwards and slammed his head against the corner of the nightstand with an audible thump. He staggered up again, one hand at his head, blood welling at his temple—Light knew he had gone too far but it was too late to stop now—L was coming at him, really and truly furious, and he needed to be ready. L ducked low and spun backwards with such grace that Light forgot himself, barely felt the jolt of the detective’s foot against his face. Light choked on blood and saliva, overbalanced, toppled over backwards onto the tangled chain, and landed hard on his hands in front of the elevator doors.

He felt his wrist shatter as he hit the ground, and he screamed as fire shot up his arm. L stopped dead, panting. Light curled up against the cool elevator doors, shaking and cradling his wrist with his intact hand. Something was very, very wrong with his arm. He couldn’t seem to move his fingers. Black spots jumped before his eyes. L held a hand to his head and limped over to where Light was huddled in a shivering heap.

“Light,” L breathed, crouching next to him. “Light, look at me.”

“Dis—” Light choked. “Dislocated shoulder. Wrist’s broken.”

“I know,” L said, blood running down the side of his face. The phone was still ringing somewhere behind them. Light swallowed with difficulty. Everything was too loud and too quiet all at once.

“I’m going to black out,” Light said, feeling the room spin.

“Keep your eyes on me,” L said. There was makeup smeared in with the blood. He took Light’s wrist in his hands, avoiding the break, and delicately edged Light’s sleeve up his arm. “No swelling yet. We have to get your watch off, Light, before it cuts off bloodflow to your hand.”

Light marveled at the cold touch of L’s fingers, the same fingers that, minutes before, had been curled into a fist aimed at Light’s face, intent on causing him as much bodily harm as possible. L unlatched Light’s watch and cast it aside with a clatter.

“I’m going to set it,” L said, “and then call Watari and get you a proper cast. We shouldn’t move you until I’ve bound it.”

L took Light’s hand in his; with his other hand, he held Light’s arm. “Hold still,” he told Light, guiding Light’s arm into alignment. Next, he braced Light’s shoulder against his own arms, and popped the joint back into place. Light shouted soundlessly at the sudden traction, too shocked to vocalize, then relaxed somewhat as L began tearing a pillowcase into strips with his mouth, and splinted the arm with the resulting makeshift bandages.

Light reached for his watch with his free hand and went to slip it into his pocket. Something sharp jabbed him as he picked it up, and he dropped it with a small gasp.

“Oh,” Light breathed, staring down at the watch. “It’s broken.”

L looked up at him. “What?”

“You broke my watch,” Light said, picking it up again and brandishing it in L’s face. The lens was cracked, and as he shook it several miniscule gears fell from the split case like metal snowflakes. “ When you kicked me into the wall...you...you _bastard—_ this watch was a gift from my father—it’s practically _priceless;_ he put aside money for years—!”

He seized L by the collar with his good hand, so that their noses were almost touching. L looked mildly cautious. A droplet of blood fell from his chin with a small wet sound. Light panted, mouthing wordlessly, praying that a horrible enough insult to spit in the detective’s face would rise to the surface of his consciousness.

“Light,” said L, now looking slightly shaken. He motioned to Light’s broken wrist. “Please reconsider your priorities.”

“Bones will mend,” Light hissed. “This watch is my most prized possession and I—”

He felt his heart skip a beat, and the words came out of his mouth before he realized what he was saying.

“I cannot lose this watch,” Light said, his voice breaking, though he himself was unsure exactly why this was so imperative. “You son of a bitch!”

Once more he lunged at L, who ducked out of the way. Light landed hard on his hands once more and received such a jolt from the impact that the world went white before his eyes. When he came to, he was lying on his back on the bed, pillows propping up his head, with two familiar faces looming over him. His wrist felt heavier than usual. He tried to lift it to examine the damage, and both faces frowned.

“Just leave it alone,” said L’s voice.

“Follow the light,” said Watari’s.

Light blinked, confused. Watari was kneeling at the edge of the bed, shining a tiny flashlight into L’s eyes.

“It’s been half an hour,” L said. “It was just a blunt cut; I’m fine.”

“Follow my finger,” Watari said. “Yes, all right, Ryuzaki. Contact me immediately if you notice any changes in your condition. Welcome back, Light. I’ve mended your arm.”

Light started, realizing that Watari was now addressing him.

“You were lucky,” Watari continued. “It was a clean break; no nerve or muscle damage.” Light tried not to think too hard about the state of his wrist. He bit his tongue.

“You boys must be careful,” Watari said as he stood and turned to leave, his normally benevolent gaze lingering quite severely on L. “You are both too valuable to become seriously incapacitated, you understand?”

Light nodded glumly. L’s profile looked angry. Watari left without another word.

“He was an army doctor, years ago,” L said.

“Which war?”

“One you wouldn’t have heard of,” said L, “and one that I am not legally allowed to discuss.”

“Oh,” said Light.

They sat together in relative silence for a while, the only noise coming from L peeling apart a frosted croissant to Light’s left.

“We’re no good for each other, are we?” Light said.

L looked over at him. A piece of croissant fell out of his mouth. “What?”

“You know how it goes. We can’t agree. We argue. We get into fistfights and injure each other. I honestly consider it part of the job at this point. We’re like some twisted variation of the proverbial old married couple.”

L choked. “If that’s what you think—”

“It was a joke,” Light said quickly. Still, the idea was somehow tantalizing to him. Light pushed the idea from his mind.

“You are truly the pinnacle of modern humor, Light Yagami.”

Light ignored the detective and turned instead to his stinging arm. “This is fantastic,” he said, gesturing to the cast ruefully. “I’ll get half the work done in twice the time, now. How am I supposed to type one-handed until this thing heals?”

“It’s not as if you’ll be working alone,” L reminded him for the thousandth time. “You and I will solve this case together, whatever it takes.”

“Like you’ll be any help, at the speed you type,” said Light.

L’s mouth fell open. “Excuse me?”

“I’ve seen the way you type,” Light continued, smirking. “What do you think your average is, about eight words a minute?”

L bristled, and looked very much like he wanted to make a retort, but refrained. He popped the rest of the croissant in his mouth and touched his index finger to his tongue to retrieve a stray piece of icing. _This is...strangely nice,_ Light thought. The calm after the storm—the banter after a fistfight. His wrist felt awful, and yet as a whole he felt...safe. Comfortable. Like things were progressing the way they should. It was like the post-panic-attack-high, in a way; once you’ve hit the bottom, the only way to go is up.

L brushed crumbs from his fingers. He leaned down, retrieved Light’s broken watch from below the bed, and inspected the shattered case with an odd expression clouding his eyes. Light watched him closely, oddly serene.

“I’ll replace the watch,” said L quietly, setting it down on the nightstand.

Light scoffed halfheartedly. “It won’t be the same,” he said.

“I can have this watch duplicated exactly and delivered to you in less than twenty-four hours, Light; it will be precisely the same.”

“No, it wont,” Light said tiredly, “for that exact reason.” He cast it a pitying glance. L leaned over to examine it again, his nonexistent brow furrowed.

“My dad got that for me as a gift after the tennis championships,” Light said. Apparently the post-fistfight-high made him more talkative than usual. “I never got to spend a lot of time with him when I was growing up, because he was always working, but he managed to make up for it in an instant with that watch—I was so happy...”

_I’m going to kill you and then myself..._

Light shivered and pushed the memory of his father with his gun aimed at Light’s head from his mind. He had started the story; he might as well continue on. “Er, well, I found the box in his closet and realized what it was, and I had to practice looking surprised in the mirror for a week beforehand. But seeing it there in its box for the first time, when I unwrapped the thing—it felt so wonderful, you understand—but then I quit tennis right afterwards...and...”

“You looked,” L said, a strange glint in his eyes.

“What?”

“You looked, beforehand,” L said.

“What—of course I did,” said Light. “And everybody does it, so don’t you dare try and tell me my percentage has gone up again.”

“No—” L said. “You just...reminded me of...” He leaned back in his chair, hugging his knees to his chest. “Let me see the watch,” he said, shaking his head. Light passed it to him carefully.

L examined the broken pieces once more, and fiddled briefly with the clasp. “I might be able to have Watari fix it,” he said, sliding his thumbnail over the tiny silver ridge. With a small scraping noise, a compartment slid out of the watch, revealing a miniscule scrap of paper secured beneath an ordinary sewing needle. L frowned at this sudden discovery. Light tilted his head in confusion, trying to comprehend what he was seeing.

“Was that in there the whole time?” he said, reaching for the paper scrap. He inspected it carefully. It was just a normal piece of paper.

“Must have been,” L said, a curious expression on his face. Light passed him the piece of paper and he held it up to the light, squinting. “Why would you keep a piece of paper in your watch, Light?”

He turned to face Light, performing the now-familiar soul-sweeping stare with those fathomless eyes of his. Light shivered.

“I have no idea,” Light said truthfully. “To the best of my knowledge, I didn’t put it there.”

“Doubtful,” L said, mostly to himself. “Light, you said this watch was your most important possession. You’re sure you don’t remember putting the paper inside it?”

Light sighed. “I don’t see how a paper scrap brings us any closer to finding Kira,” he said, “whether he’s me or not.”

“No,” said L, dipping his head as he set it aside. He gave a long-suffering sigh. “No, neither do I.”

Once Light was no longer looking, however, L pocketed it.


	4. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "That was unprofessional," L panted.

_Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate._

_Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure._

_It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us._

_—Marianne Williamson_

* * *

 

SEVEN

“Yagami-kun. Are you ready to present?”

The child nodded solemnly, as if he was preparing to give a eulogy instead of a book report, and stood from his chair and came to the front of the classroom. He surveyed the rows of blank faces before him. There was nothing he hated more than a performer who looked bored, and each presentation so far had been so halfhearted, so blasé...Light vowed to enunciate, to speak with vigor, no matter how much of a performance—how much of a _lie_ —it all was. Doing well in school was too easy for him nowadays. He yearned for something more.

Weeks turned into months turned into years, and he began to wonder if that something could actually exist.

* * *

TWELVE

“Light, you must smile more!” Sachiko said as Light came in the door one evening, his head bowed against the cold wind and his face overwhelmingly neutral. “You look so grim!”

Light looked up. He smiled.

* * *

FOURTEEN

“I’m quitting,” Light announced quietly. Then, louder. “I’m quitting.”

The bathroom mirror frowned. He knew exactly what would happen. His mother would squawk; his father would lean back in his chair with somber disappointment lining his face.

“I want to focus more on my studies,” he told the mirror.

“If I’m serious about joining the NPA after college, I can’t expend any excess energy elsewhere.”

“It no longer interests me.”

Last, but not least: “Please, just let me quit. Please, _please._ ”

He met his own eyes in the mirror again. They were wet. Crying over tennis, of all things...but this wasn’t tennis, it was much bigger—

“Light?” Sachiko called, from outside the door. “Are you in there?”

“Yeah, Mom,” Light answered, not a tremor in his voice. He took a breath and opened the door. “I’m going to study in my room, so don’t bother me, all right?”

Sachiko watched him leave fondly.

* * *

SIXTEEN

“I wish I could help _you_ with something for once, Light,” Sayu said. “You’re always helping me...and you never need any help from anybody...I just want you to know how grateful I am, really.”

Light graced her with a rare smile. “You help me every single day,” he said, and didn’t elaborate. When he turned away there was something sad in his eyes.

* * *

SEVENTEEN

How many times had he walked along the train tracks on the way home, just to remind himself of how precious it all was—how fragile, how fleeting? What a miracle he was, a living, breathing human being, pulsing neurons and racing blood and a throbbing heart, muscle and bone and a web of arteries and veins; and yet, how easy it would be to just—

It became something of a challenge. Each day he woke up, he broke his record for consecutive days of being alive. Somewhere along the way, that stopped working. It was _quality_ not _quantity_ of life that mattered, wasn’t it? And he had everything—a loving family, perfect grades, a slew of friends—acquaintances, he supposed—what else could there possibly be? What was he missing? It drove him mad.

* * *

PRESENT

_Light Yagami used to be Kira._

Dark wings and rows of gleaming teeth bared in a twisted callous smile—scarlet eyes like glowing coals flashing death at him and numbers, numbers above his head—a jagged shadow just behind him, barely out of his line of sight, like death itself following his every move—

_Kira’s power has somehow passed on to another person._

—a fringe of feathers, raven black, glittering and twisted and sharp—the silver flash of a pen and the satisfying pressure of ink meeting paper—a black object, falling out of the sky like a shadow, so quickly he thought he might have been imagining it—and there was a woman, dressed from head to toe in black leather with her back to him, walking away through the snow...

_Light Yagami now has no memory of ever being Kira._

According to witnesses, the suspect just suddenly collapsed—try to kill me, Kira! a murder on live television, and he had witnessed the whole thing—a man emptying his gun, shooting at nothing, screaming and _screaming_ and then the nearly comical _splat_ of brain matter hitting the pavement—Dark eyes and bare feet and limp strands of black hair—a girl in black lace at the door—pleased to meet you, I’m Misa Amane—

_Was that because Light Yagami wanted it to happen, or was there someone else in control of Light, lurking in the background, who gave him the power?_

—the stifling purgatory of the holding cell, where it was neither day nor night for months on end—a bloodred sunset the color of glowing eyes—wings and feathers and grotesque skeletal figures without faces, hanging in midair like perverse twisted angels—

_Light Yagami used to be Kira..._

“Fuck— _fuck,”_ Light swore under his breath, scrubbing at his eyelids as if he could erase the images from his mind.

 _I would say that he is cursed,_ L’s voice said in his head, and Light opened his eyes and faced the real L, turned around and saw Misa and his father and the rest of the task force standing around him in a semicircle, obviously waiting for his response. He looked to L, who nodded at him. _Go ahead,_ his eyes said. His newly healed wrist gave a twinge of pain.

“Given your premise,” Light said, deliberately, slowly, “It would be my will.”

But that was wrong, because Light wasn’t Kira at all, never had been—Light cringed as the words came out of his mouth. They tasted like ice.

* * *

EVENING

_I would say that he is cursed._

Snow and black leather and long black hair and the cold sting of January and all at once Light choked on air because the name _Misora, Naomi_ hit him like an electric shock. He opened his eyes again with difficulty, his heart racing. It had been much harder to shake himself free of the memory this time.

“We talked,” Light said abruptly, staring without an expression at the far wall. “I never told you. I didn’t want you to think I was guilty.”

L looked up. “What?"

“Naomi Misora,” Light said, stumbling over the name. “I met her.”

L looked as if he’d been hit in the face. “What?” he said again, in a very different tone.

“I...” Light swallowed. “I was dropping off fresh clothes for my father. She was there, in the lobby, and we took a walk outside...” Massive pieces were missing from the already blurry memory, as if he was listening to radio feedback. “It was so cold...she said she had information on the case...and that she had worked for you. And then she walked off and—” Light pressed his fingers to his mouth, horrified. “I must have been the last person to see her alive...”

L put his head in his hands. His bangs flopped into his eyes. With a start, Light realized that he was trembling, and badly.

“She said...” Light began. He cursed himself. He didn’t want to be a suspect. No—he didn’t want L to suspect him. Since when had he cared what L thought? _Tell him the truth,_ said Light’s brain, and he plunged ahead. “She said I reminded her of you.”

“Misora,” L said, with a tiny, humorless laugh. “Right on the money as usual. You do remind me of myself, Light. Uncomfortably so.”

Light started. “So it’s true? She really did work for you?”

“Yes,” L said. “Years ago. She was my eyes...my shield, Light. You understand. The Kira case is an odd one for me. I’ve never before introduced myself as L to anyone, much less my main suspect. She was a fantastic agent. I owe her a great deal.”

Light could feel a headache coming on. He palmed his forehead. “Ryuzaki,” he said. “I didn’t kill her. I didn’t—I didn’t kill _anyone._ You’ve got to believe me. I know exactly what this looks like, but I swear to you I’m not lying.”

L looked straight at him—straight _through_ him, it felt like. It had to be the lighting in the bedroom. His eyes looked wet.

Light was no stranger to concealing tears. It seemed he was among a fellow expert.

“Thirteen years,” L said at last.

Light frowned. “What?”

“Thirteen years into my career as the greatest detective in the world,” L said, “and I haven’t been wrong yet.”

He looked up at Light in nothing short of supplication.

“But I see your face, Light, I see the conviction in your eyes, and I’ve never wanted to be wrong about someone so badly in all my life.”

He said it with the practiced nonchalance that Light knew ever so well. His fingers, twisting furiously against a hole at the hem of his jeans, betrayed him.

“I wanted it to be you,” L said. “The moment I saw your file, I knew. All this time, I hoped it would be you. I—I don’t know what I’d do, now, if you are Kira. I don’t want you to... _I_ don’t want to—”

He broke off, staring desolately at his hands. Somehow, his tone left Light infuriated.

“Don’t try to play the victim here,” Light said, perhaps a shade more harshly than he had intended. “My sanity is worth more than—than your _ego,_ all right? I know it hurts to be wrong, but you’re going to have to accept that I’m not Kira, because I’m not Kira, I never was, and you had better liven up if we’re going to go through with this Sakura TV thing tomorrow.”

“Don’t start,” said L. He opened his computer, typed out an email in a language Light didn’t recognize. “I know how people like you think, Light, and—”

“Oh?” Light spat. “What do you know about me, L, other than the fact that I’m a suspect? Do you know what I’ve been through? Do you know what I’ve faced? Do you know how it feels to not have a purpose, to wake up each morning for eight years and not care whether you live or die? To be unable to tell your mother and your father because it’s too late to let them know and you don’t _want_ them to know, you want them to think everything is still fine, and it’s terrible, I felt so _terrible_ , I was the only thing wrong with my perfect life and I just wanted it to be _over—”_

He could practically feel the energy radiating from L’s brain, could feel his percentage rising as he rambled, but he just wanted to _tell L everything_ , wanted L to know his story, wanted L to feel for him the way his family could not—

“You—you, sitting there alone and controlling the world police force from behind a computer like it’s all just one big joke—don’t you _dare_ pretend to understand me, you heartless, two-faced, stone-cold, utter bastard—I can’t stand you and your _habits—”_

L began to laugh. It was not a happy laugh. Light’s anger evaporated, giving way to unmitigated shock.

“You really think this is _genuine?”_ L said, gesturing to the wrinkled sweater, the owlish black eyes, the fringe of coal-black hair hanging across his heavily made-up face. “All of this—you think this is me? You don’t know _anything_ about me, Light Yagami, _anything.”_

He heaved his laptop aside, chains clinking. It landed with a soft _thump_ on the bedspread.

“I don’t suppose you were ever indoctrinated into an— _institution_ that fashions child prodigies into human weapons? Destroyed all traces of your records at the age of seven point five simply because you’ve been taught to put aside your own self-worth in favor of the greater good? Legally, I don’t _exist,_ Light, is that what you want? I was too young to understand—I had no choice—it was that or the streets again—I had barely existed in the first place—”

L took a great shuddering breath. He wasn’t done.

“Ever come downstairs on Christmas morning to find your first decent pair of foster parents dead at the kitchen table?” he shouted. “Or had a—a dear comrade impersonate you, commit three murders, then attempt suicide by self-immolation, only to be killed by your first real companion in this world years later? You don’t know what horrors I’ve seen, Light. You have—you have no idea.”

He looked haunted, spectral, and Light half expected him to turn into one of the skeletal angels from his nightmares when he blinked. Paradoxically—Light’s breath caught in his throat as the thought came to him—L had never looked more human.

“I don’t celebrate Christmas,” Light said shakily, at long last.

Light blinked again, and Ryuzaki was back, his invisible brow knotted. He looked away, apparently very busy with something on the bedside table. “Of course you don’t,” he said. “I forgot. Please forgive me, Light. I didn’t mean to shout. I shouldn’t have said all that. I just...I’ve never—”

“It’s all right,” Light said quickly. “I understand. I’ve never talked about myself before either, least of all to someone like—” He stopped. He didn’t know exactly what he wanted to say, or if he even wanted to continue. “You,” he decided at last.

 _I wouldn’t mind if he kissed me,_ Light thought once more. At once he wanted nothing more than L’s lips on his own.

L put his face in his hands once more. “Misora is dead,” he said at last. “I had hoped—but—”

He looked at Light again, as if he was trying to memorize every contour of his face and imprint it in his memory. His eyes traced Light’s lips, the ridge of his nose, his eyebrows raised in shock and surprise, his lovely almond eyes, his ruffled hair.

“Everything changes tomorrow,” he said. “Most of all, us. Whatever— _this_ is—” L gestured to the pair of them, sitting on the bed together— “I don’t want it to be over. Is that so wrong of me?”

Thunder boomed in the distance. They both glanced towards the darkened window.

“Me either,” Light whispered... _dark wings and jet-black feathers and burning ruby eyes—Why would you keep a piece of paper in your watch, Light? wings and eyes and shadows...I would say that he is cursed...Naomi Misora walking away through the snow...I’m going to kill you and then myself...a horrible sinking triumph in his chest—_

L moaned and leaned back in bed.

“What is it?” Light said.

“My ears are ringing,” L muttered. “It just happens sometimes.”

It had started to rain. The sound felt like a friend.

Light leaned down close to L. “I’m slipping, L,” he said. “I don’t want to go back to—before...don’t want to forget what it’s like to want to be alive...”

It only felt natural when their lips met.

A lifetime passed, and there they were still, Light spread out on top of L, who sighed as Light’s eyelashes brushed his cheek...chaste and sweet and breathless, they sank into the bed, entwined together in some twisted semblance of symmetry. Light breathed in lavender and mint and vanilla and ran his hands through L’s hair, reveling in its softness beneath his fingertips, as L’s own hands trailed across Light’s back, feeling every vertebra beneath the fabric of his shirt, resting in the dip between his shoulders.

“Who are you?” Light whispered, as their lips came apart. “I mean, if Ryuzaki isn’t genuine?”

L smiled sadly.

“I wish I could tell you,” he said. “Ryuzaki is me, Light, or at least parts of him are. Some of it had to be authentic. It was a long-term undertaking.”

They met each other’s eyes, and, if they had come to some silent agreement, reached for each other again.

There was nothing chaste about it now, and they kissed frantically, recklessly, as if it was the last night of the world. Light arched his back, his hands reaching beneath L’s plain shirt and feeling L’s thin torso. L’s fingers fluttered at Light’s hips, undoing the buttons of Light’s nightshirt, and he pressed kisses into Light’s collarbone and down his chest—with a joint effort they got Light’s shirt off him, and L moaned, seeing Light’s bare chest and bony arms—now they worked on L’s shirt, trying to get the damn thing up above his head—

They collapsed on each other, half-naked and panting. Light’s heart raced, and he froze suddenly, reality beginning to sink in.

“What is it?” L panted. “Do you want to stop?”

“No...” Light said breathlessly. “No—I just—I’ve never actually—done this—”

“Me either,” L gasped. “Let’s...let’s just...”

Light pulled L on top of him. This felt right, it felt _wonderful,_ and he pressed their hips together and L cried out—thunder and lightning and rain and rhythms in the dark—Light nearly laughed aloud at the ludicrousness of the situation, but there was something exhilarating here as well. They were both naked now, and Light was shocked at how thin L was. He wrapped his arms around L, ran his fingers over every part of him he could reach, wanting nothing more than to take him in— he paused again, shocked; there was a constellation of pinpricks on L’s arm, centered in the crook of his elbow, and Light made a small surprised noise against L’s jaw.

“Are these—?”

“Cocaine,” L breathed. “It was...a long time ago, Light—I was eighteen, I was in between cases —I didn’t know what I was getting into—I didn’t care about the future, I just wanted to disappear—”

“You were—a long time ago—how old _are_ you?” Light panted in a hot whirlwind of hands and blankets and breath. “I’ll be twenty-five next week,” L whispered. L’s fingers slipped down his pelvis, in between his thighs, and Light moaned.

_“Please...”_

“Just for a night,” L gasped, “before everything changes...let’s just—pretend everything is normal—” He kissed down Light’s pelvis. The pressure on his hips mounted, and Light’s toes curled and he involuntarily cried out, fists clenched, fire dancing in his midriff.

L sighed a gusty sigh. “All right?” he whispered.

 _“Yes,”_ Light moaned. “L...”

For once, L didn’t object to the name. He kissed Light again, lower this time, and Light seized handfuls of L’s hair, fingernails scraping against L’s scalp,  and gave a desperate whimper, louder than he would have dared with anybody else—

There was a sort of pleasant rhythm to it at first, Light arching his hips towards L’s ministrations, but their perfect, controlled cadence was quickly giving way to something rougher, and they writhed like some beautiful disaster—a pained frenzy of tangled bodies and Light felt so _alive,_ more alive than he had felt for years, and he cried aloud into the dark room as L whispered his name again and again and again—he prayed that the walls were soundproof

—and then it was a dam breaking, cascading, spilling—Light was spilling, spilling, his face twisted from pleasure and pain and passion, and he flung his arms around L’s torso and shuddered as waves of ecstasy rippled through him—he thought he might be shouting, but he was without ears or eyes, entirely incorporeal in the moment; he floated back into his aching body but warmth was washing over him and he loved the feeling—L’s spidery fingers found his face and their mouths collided in a mess of tongues and teeth and L choked back a bitten-off cry as he himself climaxed, turned his face away, and whispered, _“Light—”_

L seized fistfuls of bedsheets, kicked and gasped and hid his face in the bend of his arm so that all Light could see was his mouth, open and perfect and wet—and he fell back, weak and trembling, against the bed...Light’s eyes rejoined the rest of his body and he stared up at the dark ceiling, saw lightning flash at the edge of his peripheral vision, and realized that he was crying.

“That was unprofessional,” L panted, with the air of one merely commenting on the weather. Light snorted, his eyes still damp. _Unprofessional_ didn’t even begin to cover it.

L gave a shaky laugh. Light smiled, finding that he didn’t mind that he was crying—that he didn’t mind much of _anything_ right now, and out of nowhere both of them were laughing in the pitch-black room at how absurd it all was, detective and suspect naked together in bed, both trying to regain a normal breathing rhythm.

L, Misa, Kira, Higuchi, the case, Sakura TV, the nightmares—none of it mattered here and now; all that mattered was that L was warm and his breath was warm and his hair smelled like lavender and mint and vanilla—all that mattered was that Light could feel L’s chest rising and falling, could feel his heart beating against his ribcage. Perhaps it all was coming to an end, but the end was not here, not now.

They stayed awake together for quite some time. It seemed neither of them could stop laughing.

Light dreamed of glowing eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ((cackles into void))
> 
> thanks to princedarcy/justiceforged for beta'ing !


	5. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everything Goes Wrong Again, Very Rapidly

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh my G O D...I've been wanting to get to this point in the fic forever, I'm so excited. I hope you enjoy it. From here on out it's total canon divergence. Expect lots more Wammys. :o

_Never say goodbye because goodbye means going away and going away means forgetting._

― J.M. Barrie

* * *

 1982

Everybody knew exactly what was in the box, but they all pretended not to look when they went past. It was a soggy gray cube that had once contained a washing machine, and it was tucked between two decaying crates like a secret. Most days all that was visible of its solitary inhabitant was a matted tangle of chin-length black hair, but sometimes people could catch a glimpse of frostbitten fingers and haunted grey eyes. He looked more like a wild animal than a tiny malnourished child. Passerby would walk a little more quickly after seeing him, and gather their coats a little more tightly around themselves, thankful for the blessed warmth. London winters were so awfully bleak, after all, and they all had their own healthy families to attend to at home. You simply couldn’t save everybody.

* * *

1986

He watched his birth certificate ignite, watched his old life go up in a thin trail of smoke. The paper burned in seconds, starting with black spots and then long strings of smoke turning to yellow tapered flickers and then a great plume of violet light and heat that curled the edges of the paper in on itself like some glowing exotic flower. A single spark rose from the smoke, then blinked out above his head. Soon the smoke disappeared as well, dissipating into the air like a ghost, but the flames were burned into his retinas, flashing violet ether before his eyes. He was gone, erased, invisible to the world.

It was surprisingly underwhelming.

A single business-card sized slip of paper slid out of the machine before him, with a single character printed on it in black gothic font. He picked it up between two fingers and examined it closely, his eyes sweeping over the elegant black curves. He smiled in the dimness. He felt the letter on his lips, appreciating how comfortably it slid against his tongue. L. I am L. He had never been needed— _wanted—_ before. It felt good.

* * *

1996

By seventeen, he had had far more cigarettes than square meals. During cases they kept his mind and his hands occupied. When the cases were finished he rotted. His mind tore itself into shreds and his body wasted away. He was a shell.

“I need a case,” he would moan into the too-hot pillows, “I just need a good case.” And Quillsh would smooth his curls from his forehead and check his temperature and bring him a hot cup of chamomile tea. There were china shards strewn across the floor and cobwebs in the windows. _That’s the dead room,_ the other children at the orphanage whispered to each other. It was at the very end of the hall, where the floorboards creaked madly and the light struggled to filter in the one circular window through inches of dust. Mr. Wammy’s nephew stayed there sometimes, but nobody ever saw him—he was a ghost, a myth. Sometimes they could hear china breaking against the floor, and they continued their scholarly activities with a bit more caution. He was an odd one, a—recluse.

Near and Mello knew.

* * *

1999

The concierges watched the visitors come and go with mild interest. A silver-haired old man with kind eyes and a mysterious sort of air often carried the luggage up from the lobby. Most evenings there was a tall dark woman with a wide-brimmed hat and long curls of black hair pinned behind her head; in the afternoons, a distracted-looking young man in a coal-black suit and pointed shoes that shone like gleaming mirrors. In the mornings he was more disheveled, his hair in curlers and his bathrobe tied in a hurry, either on the phone or waiting for it to ring, staggering downstairs to consult with someone on another floor. Sometimes there were others, like the woman with the blond curls and red lips who moved like a shadow; often there was a man with her, tall and broad and confident, with charming blue eyes; once they caught a glimpse of a pale man with a fringe of long black hair and an icy stare, carrying what looked like an artist’s portfolio into the elevator. It was an odd group, but none of the concierges could bring themselves to ask.

L never stayed anywhere for more than a week. For years his life was a whirlwind of hotel suites and airports and conference calls. He would walk through museums, galleries, botanic gardens, conservatories, when he had an hour to himself, but none of it had any effect. He couldn’t seem to make himself feel. All he saw were autopsies, case files, victim reports, databases full of numbers. His ears began to ring constantly, and the numbers got into his dreams.

* * *

2002

And then B...

And then B.

His bones ached. For the first time in his life he wanted to retire, to disappear. He felt—dead. His eyes looked it. They had lost their gleam. He constantly mentally thanked Misora for her work, missing her company, however limited their contact had been. He was pale and exhausted, clutching a patchwork quilt around his thin shoulders, wary of the fire in the fireplace, and a small blond head bounced around the region of his trembling wrist, chattering idly.

“Mello—Mello,” he said, as firmly as he could. His voice cracked. “Listen to me, I just need some time by myself right now, I’m tired and I’ve got to...sleep for a while...”

Mello’s thin face fell, but L gave him a tiny weak smile and tucked a stray piece of blond hair behind the child’s ear. “Remind me tomorrow,” he said, “there’s a case I’ve got to tell you about.”

And he wrapped the patchwork quilt around himself a bit more tightly, climbed up the stairs with one quaking hand on the railing, and disappeared into the room at the end of the hall.

He was twenty-two years old and he had felt the pain of a thousand lives.

* * *

NOVEMBER

“Not interested,” he drawled lazily through a dizzying cloud of smoke.

“Tell them to consult with the NPA...”

“I’m not in.”

Fireworks in the sky and a letter in his coat pocket. “I’m terribly sorry, Matt; I’ve got to get back to Heathrow immediately. But give him this, please.”

“I won’t take it. Don’t call again.”

Low and sultry: “Deneuve is not available right now...”

He hadn’t had a case in over three weeks when he noticed the pattern. A kidnapper doesn’t conveniently die of a heart attack barely a minute after being broadcast on the news. Immediately the word _shinigami_ flashed through his mind and an image of B, scarred and melted and huddled in a Los Angeles prison cell, appeared behind his eyelids. He shoved it aside.

L pulled up the complete list of victims as if in a trance and felt anticipation glisten in the pit of his stomach. He could feel himself coming back to life.

“No doubt you’ve heard,” came Watari’s familiar voice from his monitor. His image, slow to load, appeared through a cloud of static.

L inclined his head. “I’m already looking into it. Tell the ICPO I’ll be contacting them soon. I’ll explain everything then.”

That familiar gleam was back in his eyes. He reached behind him for a case of eyeshadow.

* * *

DECEMBER

There he was, one solitary human being crouching in the dark, as if nothing had changed since those London days years and years ago, when people’s eyes slid past him and he curled up in the shadows and hoped for something to happen. “I am justice,” he announced to the room, to the blackness pressing in against his eyeballs.

It was nothing personal.

It occurred to him then that despite Watari’s steadfast companionship, despite his team of thieves, despite Wedy and Aiber and Near and Mello and the rest of them at the orphanage, despite Misora and her loyalty, despite Tailor, who he had just sacrificed in the name of justice—despite of all of them, he had never been more alone.

Some people were romantics. L was an opportunist.

* * *

PRESENT

They were curled up like a pair of question marks, entangled nearly symmetrically, hands on shoulders and feet against shins. L pinched the bridge of his nose and attempted to extricate himself from Light, who stirred feebly. They were both still naked, and L dragged one palm across his eyes and came away with inky black powder smudged across his fingers. Light looked so small, lying there with one skinny arm folded in on his chest, and L watched him breathe for a while, not really caring that his makeup was coming off, that his carefully straightened hair was turning to damp black curls.

“Morning,” Light said weakly, his eyes still closed. He reached blindly for his shirt, which was dangling off the side of the bed.

So it hadn’t been a dream. “Morning,” L groaned, and put his face in his hands as he attempted to process things. It had been wonderful, but it was over, and there was no point in dwelling on it any longer. Out of habit he moved with Light as he retrieved his shirt, to avoid getting the handcuffs wrapped around either of their wrists, but with a jolt he realized that the handcuffs were completely off, tangled in a gleaming heap on the carpet. He felt oddly naked without them on, to say nothing of the fact that his clothes were strewn around the edge of the bed. What a glorious catastrophe. L tied a bedsheet around himself like a Roman senator before collecting his clothes from the floor. They both put the handcuffs back on in a hurry—judging from the angle of the sun in the windows, they were already late.

“I’m missing a sock,” Light said, and dove beneath the bed. There was a small thud and a quickly bitten-off swear before Light surfaced, fully clothed, his face deep pink from embarrassment. “We broke the box spring,” he whispered, mortified.

Matsuda looked nervous but determined when they arrived downstairs, and Light clapped him on the shoulder. “It’ll be fine,” he said. “Everything will be fine.”

Watari chose not to ask why L was limping as he got into his chair—he must have pulled a muscle the night before—and instead escorted Matsuda towards the door with a lingering vague smile.

“Morning, Dad,” Light said, as Soichiro appeared at the door with a bundle of spare suits. L gave the chief a nod, hoping it would be enough, and tried very hard not to think thoughts like _your son has fantastic lips, Mr. Yagami_. Very luckily, nobody pointed out that they had put the handcuffs on the wrong hands.

It was a beautiful, cold day—a Day that Meant Something, Mello would have said in one of his letters. L had never seen a bluer sky. He almost longed for rain. Aiber was procuring an escape vehicle; Wedy was out in the city, her wireless transmitters all turned off. As Mogi went upstairs to retrieve Misa from her room, L forcibly, mentally restrained himself from thinking about the shape of Light’s lips as he took a dainty sip of coffee.

Mogi rejoined them downstairs with Misa trailing behind him. “Good luck, Matsu!” she called to Matsuda, who grinned widely from the monitors and returned her enthusiastic wave as a team of makeup artists straightened his tie. “Today’s the day!”

She kissed Light on the cheek, leaving a pair of pink smudges, and L curled up more tightly in his chair, feeling more than ever as if he had overstepped some massive boundary. He avoided everyone’s eyes for the rest of the morning.

* * *

AFTERNOON

“All right,” L said at last. “Chief, let’s start the broadcast.”

“Yes,” came Soichiro’s voice on the other line. They heard Demegawa shouting in the background, and Matsuda climbed into his chair as the crew secured the panel in front of his face.

“Light, get me a visual on Higuchi,” L said, and Light typed a string of commands into his keyboard. “Make sure he has access to a television.”

For a split second the screens went black, and then—

And then.

There was Higuchi, sipping wine in his minimalist study. At first L thought it was a trick of the light. Light gave an audible gasp from next to him, a horrible shuddering sound like a dying man.

And then L saw it too. Bones and ribs and glowing eyes and skeleton wings and clouds of floating hair; long white fingers like talons; an emaciated angel with fangs and great spikes down its back like some sort of—some sort of—

L saw B’s smirking face flash in front of his eyes once more, and the word slid from his charred lips as if he was telling a joke. Shinigami. _Shinigami..._

“We’re all set to broadcast,” came Soichiro’s voice. “I see Higuchi. He’s got the TV on.”

“L,” Light choked. L tore his eyes away from the grotesque angel’s and faced Light, who looked as if he was about to fall out of his chair. _“L_ tell me you’re seeing—”

L gave the tiniest of nods. He couldn’t breathe; couldn’t feel his hands or feet. He felt skeletal fingers on his throat, glowing eyes pressing against his dark ones. _B...shinigami eyes..._

 _“L,”_ Light said again, his voice rising about an octave. “That’s—that’s the thing from my dream, I swear on my life, I’ve seen it before, I’m—”

L seized Light by the shirtsleeve and dragged him away from the microphones. He knelt down dizzily —his head was spinning, and the floor swerved up at him as he went down—then steadied himself, attempted to calm his breathing.

“You can see it?” he murmured, as loudly as he dared. He felt as if those glowing eyes were watching him. Light nodded, his own eyes wide and haunted.

“We’re the only ones,” Light breathed. “Just us.”

L’s breaths were coming ragged and shallow. He wobbled, reached for the wall, missed, and fell against Light’s shoulder.

“L?” Light said. L saw spirals, and Light’s face turned to a gray blur.

“B,” he gasped, when he could breathe again. “B was _right—”_

“What the hell?” Light said in a choked whisper. “Who’s—”

But L didn’t hear the rest. In the shadow of a shinigami...did every Kira have one? Light? Misa? That whole time he had known him, had watched him...what if there had been a shinigami behind Light—when they had played tennis, gone out for coffee, when he had fallen out of his chair during that broadcast, when they had gone to the hospital when the chief had fallen ill—L shuddered violently, tried to regain a normal breathing rhythm. B had always said he could see death...

_I don’t think you have the eyes...L, do you know, shinigami love apples? We can confirm our identities by showing our shinigami to each other..._

_The eyes..._

L couldn’t think...a hundred sounds echoed in his head...Light’s shoulder was warm, and his sweater scratched L’s cheek...

“All—all right, let’s just—think about this rationally,” Light said, as if he was speaking from the bottom of a well. “Maybe it only wants certain people to see it. It’s obviously...it’s obviously the source of Kira’s power—”

Light’s voice broke. He put his fingers to his temples and buried his head in his arms.

“I don’t know what to think,” he whispered. “I don’t know what’s going on...”

“Maybe,” L rasped, and ran his tongue over his dry lips, “maybe you can only see it if—if you’ve killed before.” Light gave a jolt, took his head out of his arms, and stared at him in horror.

“Assuming that you used to be Kira,” L continued, hating what he was saying. “Unless—there can’t be anything else—”

He stopped suddenly, and a horrible realization hit him. A hot arrow of fear shot down his back. Slowly, carefully, he reached into his back pocket and pulled out a tiny scrap of lined paper.

* * *

6:54

“We’ve got to bring him in,” L said into his headset. The whirring of the helicopter blades lulled him into some sort of horrified hypnosis. The sun had set, and the expressway glittered cruelly beneath them. He had gotten his shivering voice under control, but his hands were shaking at the helicopter controls. There was Higuchi’s car, scarlet like glowing shinigami eyes, traveling at about double the speed limit towards the nearest off ramp, and for a moment it seemed like he was escaping them—

And then there were bright lights and police cars and Aizawa’s team was here; L’s heart sank; he had hoped that Aizawa wouldn’t come back—the last thing he wanted was to deprive young children of their father. But this part was nearly over, he thought as he trained the spotlight on Higuchi’s car. Broken glass glittered against the pavement. Higuchi was finished.

It was what came next that worried him.

* * *

7:20

Light Yagami screamed a horrible, piercing, tortured scream that sent awful shivers down L’s spine. He looked down. Light had the notebook; it was as if his hands were welded to the plain black cover—his eyes popped in his head, his lips were cracked and bleeding, veins and tendons pulsed in his neck—he was turning blue—

He ran out of breath, but his mouth was still open in a silent scream, his eyes were still staring far beyond anything L could see, and L knew this was the end. Kira had won. Light collapsed in his chair, choking for lack of air, and L snatched the notebook out of his hands as if he could undo whatever awful thing Light had just seen—Light flung his headset aside and lunged for the floor of the helicopter; his hands found the pistol L had offered him, not half an hour before—they were struggling, kicking and wrestling and scratching, and finally Light emerged with the gun in his hands and aimed it not at L but at his own temple—his finger twitched on the trigger—

 _“Stop!”_ L screamed, dark horror rising in his throat, and knocked the gun out of Light’s hands—it landed spinning against the helicopter floor and Light dove once more, strained for it, his fingers spread wide, but L tackled him again, twisted his newly-healed arm behind his back—Light gasped in pain, tears pouring down his broken, pale face, and sank to the floor with a desperate sob of disgust.

 _You were right,_ his lips said, moving soundlessly, and he opened his mouth, prepared to bite his own tongue—

“Light!” L shouted. “Light, _get up, he’s escaping!”_

Light paused in the confusion, and L seized him by the shoulder and dragged him to the helicopter doors. Higuchi was staggering away, and the remainder of the task force was crouched around the chief, whose tinted helmet was splattered with blood—

They landed on the pavement in unison, L still dragging Light behind him.

“Stop!” L shouted once more, and whipped out the pistol again and aimed for Higuchi’s head. Higuchi turned at the sound—he grabbed his own gun, slick with blood, and fired once, twice, three times. Light flung out an arm, shoved L out of the way of the bullets—then they were both falling, for what seemed like an eternity, and the world went silent as they sped towards the ground. L’s collar was wet, and as he landed against the pavement he screamed as fire exploded up and down his shoulder—Light landed on top of him, unmoving, but now Higuchi was out of bullets and L had his pistol—he raised the thing one-handed, his shoulder giving an awful twinge. He prayed the bullet had passed straight through him and wasn’t lodged anywhere, but now wasn’t the time to worry about that—he aimed, let out a long shuddering breath, and managed to shoot Higuchi in the thigh. He went down with a small noise of pain just as Light staggered up, bleeding, tears streaming down his grimy face—but he was only grazed, right on the edge of his beautiful cheek. Something was wrong—L dropped the gun, pressed his hands to the hot ragged hole in his shoulder, trying to stop the blood from spurting so badly, but Light gave another inhuman scream and reached for L’s windpipe. L choked, clawed at Light’s fingers with his own slick bloody ones, felt Light’s tears splashing against his face. He gasped, trembling, convulsing, not knowing if Soichiro, Higuchi, or any of the others were alive or dead—

 _Stop,_ he mouthed at Light. _“Stop,”_ he whispered.

 _“He’ll kill me!”_ Light screamed, in a voice that was hardly his own, and his fingers closed, vicelike, on L’s throat.

Higuchi was—was coming back, L saw through a bloody haze; he ran, limping, past the pair of them, climbed into the helicopter, and with the last of his strength he saw him rummaging around for the notebook—

 _“No,”_ L gasped, and then Light let go of his throat and dove in front of him just in time because a plume of fire burst into the sky, smoke pouring into the night like a scarlet and gold river; the helicopter had burst into flames with Higuchi inside and through his stupor L heard him screaming, _screaming_ —it occurred to him that Light had shielded him from the blast; he heard Light sobbing awful, wracking sobs and L reached up with his good hand and put his hand on Light’s shoulder. The world was scarlet, and now a thousand fluttering sparks were raining down like twisted fireworks; L almost wanted to reach out and catch one but he knew they would burn his fingers; knew they were the beautiful glowing pages of a deadly notebook, falling like overlarge snowflakes from the night sky.

* * *

UNKNOWN TIME

Unbeknownst to everyone, someone slipped across the highway just beyond the police barricade with a burning hot, yet intact, black notebook under his arm. A skeletal angel with glowing eyes followed close behind.


	6. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> god ok sorry this one is pretty short and i haven't edited it at all. also sorry for another cliffhanger lmao

_He was too weak; he could scarcely raise his hand._

_Besides, now that he was quite alone, condemned, deserted,_

_as those who are about to die are alone,_

_there was a luxury in it,_ _an isolation full of sublimity;_

_a freedom which the attached can never know._

_—Virginia Woolf_

* * *

7:19

It was like the moment you touch your hand to a hot stove, Light thought. You know how much it’s going to hurt, even though you can’t feel the pain yet, and you can’t bring yourself to pull your hand back because information is moving much too slowly between your hand and your brain. Or maybe it’s time that’s moving too slowly. Or—or maybe you’re the one moving too slowly, slogging through time as if it was mud. That’s just the thing, isn’t it? People are alive until they are dead, and they’re not dead a moment sooner than the moment they die—it hurt his head to think about. There he was, with his hands on the black book, reaching across the helicopter controls with his elbow on the dashboard, and a jolt of dread snapped through his brain. Don’t touch, said something in his brain, but it was too late. It was just a notebook. And yet something sinister radiated from it, the same way L’s face glowed green in the light from the helicopter controls. It was as if they were underwater...L looked like he was drowning, and the notebook felt dusty and leathery in his hands, and his fingers ached and static flickered invisibly through his hair and his eyeballs were burning in his skull because—because—

_I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira I am Kira_

He was rigid and screaming and his fingers curled in against the black cover and he trembled from the shock, from the continuous censorlike scream assaulting his brain at an impossible pitch and volume. He wanted nothing more than to let go, but the book wouldn’t let go of _him—_ his hands wouldn’t move—he was stuck, his hands were melting, his spine breaking under the weight of his own scream—

And then L knocked the thing out of his hands, shouting—everything had gone oddly silent, save for an immense pounding in Light’s ears—they both watched the notebook flop open innocently against the dashboard before falling to the floor and Light dove after it—his body was no longer his own, and all he knew was that he must reach that notebook before L; his life was at stake...

There was another Light, watching serenely as if from afar. _Pick up the notebook,_ the Light said, nodding, radiating encouragement at him. Light seized it but the cover burned him; he scrabbled against the floor, his knees stinging, his palms bloody, and his hands found L’s pistol.

_Pick up the notebook._

_“No!”_ Light screamed to himself. Pick up the notebook. No! Pick it up. _I am Kira. I am Kira. I am Kira. I am Kira. I am Kira._ It was a heartbeat, each reaffirmation like a pulse of blood in his ears, a surge of air flooding into his lungs, but it was painful—it hurt to breathe, hurt to think. Dreadful air, dreadful blood. Pick up the notebook. His skull felt like fire. _I am Kira. I am Kira. I am Kira. I am Kira. I am Kira. I am Kira._ He vaguely felt L’s hands on his own, clawing at his skin, but all he knew was the pain in his head, the horrible throb of reality between his ears.

_You’ll die...pick up the notebook..._

Light stood up, gasping for breath, and rammed the pistol against his temple. “Pick up the notebook!” he screamed aloud, or at least he thought it was aloud—thought it was him. _I am Kira._ There were tears in his eyes, scalding his ice-cold face and running into the corners of his cracked lips. _I am Kira._ The other Light observed him with an air of mild curiosity. _I am Kira._ His fingernail clicked against the trigger.

Two impacts. L’s hand collided with the gun and it went spinning through the air; L himself collided with Light and they fell sprawling against the helicopter controls. _Pick up the notebook,_ the other Light said, less calmly now. Light choked on air as L hit him hard between the shoulder blades, seizing his arm and wrenching it around behind his back—his eyes were swimming in molten tears, and the interior of the helicopter glistened, kaleidoscopic, before him— _I am Kira—_

You’ll die, said L’s eyes—You’ll die, said the blinking buttons above his head—You’ll die, said the pain in his wrist, in his shoulder, in his knees and his palms—You’ll die, said the black notebook from its place on the floor—You’ll die, you’ll die, you’ll die, you’ll die—You’ll die, said Light’s tongue, and he knew—he knew—he opened his mouth, made to bite down hard—he could nearly taste the blood, the salt and the iron and the slick wetness of it and he knew blackness was coming and he welcomed it— _I am Kira, I am Kira, I am Kira—_

A gunshot from beyond the helicopter and L’s hands were on his shoulders, steering him out into the night— the interstate glimmered like a venomous snake and tears were still falling thick and fast— _pick up the notebook—_ but then Light saw his father sinking to the pavement bloody and his mind was clear for a split second; Higuchi in his still-perfect suit was sprinting off down the interstate and L shouted something at his retreating figure.

Gunshots—three of them. _Move_ said Light’s brain and he dove at L, pinned him to the ground out of the line of fire, felt something whistle past his cheek and sever a lock of hair from his head. He was intact; he was fine—but something was wrong; one of the bullets had found its mark and L’s shoulder was hot and wet and bloody and Light screamed again because L’s face was burned into his retinas as if the other Light had branded it there. L could have died—he could have died—one of those bullets could have hit his heart had Light not intervened—

_Kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him_

Higuchi was down and L dropped the gun, holding his bloody shoulder. _Kill him. Kill him and pick up the notebook._

Light seized L’s throat with both hands and pinned him down again. L choked and scrabbled for purchase against Light’s fingers— _Kill him or I’ll kill you—I’ll kill you—I’ll kill you—_

Stop, Light gasped at the voice, at the other Light, but the more he pressed on L’s trachea the louder the other Light chanted. You’ll die. You’ll die. I’ll kill you. “He’ll kill me,” Light choked out, and he could nearly feel the other Light’s hands on his own throat...L’s eyes were closing, and the voice was not getting any quieter. _Stop,_ he breathed with the last of his strength and sanity and—and—

The helicopter went up in flames.

The voices went silent— _everything_ went silent; he was operating in a total void, with unlimited time and space through which to float. Everything was gone. No pain, no voices, no L. There was a ringing—not a noise, but an intense sensation in his head, and he felt sick—then the world started coming back, and it was on fire. He shielded L from the blast, from the column of sparks blossoming into the sky, and felt immeasurable hotness on his face—his hair was blasted back out of his eyes, and he understood that his eyebrows had just been singed completely off...

One layer of sound was coming back at a time—the distant cars, the roaring of the burning helicopter, the murmur of voices behind him, the wailing of sirens. He watched in disbelief as it began to snow. He reached out for a snowflake and it burned his fingers and he gave a yelp and drew his fingers back, elbowing L in the chest. L doubled over, holding his shoulder, and Light fell against him, numb with shock. It was as if the other Light had been knocked clean out of his head from the blast, but Light knew that he remained just out of sight, waiting for the right time to whisper sinister things into the corner of Light’s subconscious. Light squeezed his eyes shut from the heat, feeling tears pour down his grimy face...

“Light,” L gasped.

The sound of his own name brought him back to the present and he gave a weak cough, reaching for L’s bloody hand.

“Light, Higuchi’s dead...the notebook...” L continued, but doubled over again, pressing his hand to his shoulder even harder than before.

Light found L’s hand and squeezed hard, dragging the detective to his feet. “Run,” he choked out, and he ran, L stumbling behind him.

* * *

Wedy unlocked the passenger side door and let them both in, looking shaken. “Leave him up front where I can see him,” she told Light, who climbed into the back seat, grateful to be left alone for a while. “And don’t you dare bleed on my new upholstery,” she said in L’s direction as she took off down the interstate past the police barricade.

L tore a strip of cloth off the bottom of his shirt and pressed it against his shoulder, grimacing. Light watched his profile change colors as they sped past a multitude of city lights, feeling sick with fear. He felt the other Light tap him on the shoulder, but when he looked around with a jolt, no one was there. Everything that had just happened seemed to be fading into a sort of dull horror _._ The notebook, Higuchi, the explosion, his father—

“What’ve you got? What happened to the Chief?” asked Wedy sharply, as if she had read his mind.

L winced as he spoke. “The Chief is alive,” he said. “Aizawa was with him. The notebook—”

L’s face turned green as they exited the highway and came to a stoplight. The exit ramp was abandoned, as was the narrow street they had just arrived on. “...Don’t know about the notebook,” L finished. Light felt another wave of nausea wash over him and clutched the woven fabric of his seatbelt with both hands. He was suddenly all too aware of the exquisite amount of pain he was in, and he unwittingly let out a low moan.

“Hang on, Yagami, we’re almost here,” Wedy said, slamming on the breaks and sending the car spinning into an empty parking lot. “Come on,” she said, cutting the engine. She pressed something rectangular into Light’s hand. “Police ID. Let’s go.”

* * *

A loft above an abandoned warehouse, Light thought, was hardly a comforting spot to regroup, but Wedy led the tiny group through a locked door into an astonishingly well-furnished room. L seemed to know exactly where he was going, and knelt heavily before an ornate chest to retrieve a wad of gauze and a roll of bandages. Light kicked at the oriental rug, marveling at how expensive it looked. The more he looked around the more he saw: there were boxes and boxes of artifacts stacked against one wall, and shelves upon shelves of undoubtedly priceless sculptures and paintings and gemstones against another. It rather reminded him of one of L’s hotel suites. Wedy lit up what looked like an original Tiffany lamp as Light slumped into a handsome chaise, holding his head.

L, perched atop an elegant loveseat, wound bandages around his shoulder with one hand and dialed a number into his phone with the other. “Wedy, get us online,” he said. Wedy lit a cigarette and produced a laptop and a plug from one of the boxes, then joined Light on the chaise and opened it up. She offered L a lighter and the pack of cigarettes, which, to Light’s surprise, he accepted.

“You’re the hacker, Yagami,” Wedy said. “Can you get into the NPA’s files from here?”

Light massaged his forehead with his palm in an attempt to convince himself to focus. “I—yes,” he said. “Yes, I can.” He accepted the laptop and inputted a series of commands. “What do you need me to do?”

L tore a strip of gauze off the roll with his teeth. “Have the task force connect with us as soon as they can. Make sure they stay away from headquarters. We must assume that whoever has the notebook knows our faces.” He flicked Wedy’s lighter and took a long drag from his cigarette, then spoke into the phone. “Watari, I’m sending you our locat—Matsuda? What’s—”

L listened for a while, puffing on his cigarette, his frown deepening with every distorted word from the other end of the line. He closed the phone with a snap, looking pale.

Light finished up on the laptop and set it down on a crate. “L?” he said. The other Light shook his head at him. _Don’t._ He pushed forward anyway, ignoring the pressure building behind his eyes. “I need to talk to you.”

Wedy’s gaze moved from L, smoking and pallid, to Light, singed and shaking, and she gave L a pointed look. “I’ll be outside,” she said, and closed the door on them.

L looked at Light expectantly. Light took a breath and suddenly the words were pouring out of him, faster than the other Light could keep up with. “I don’t know how I know—but I know now —and I always was, I must have—forgotten or something, somehow—but when I touched that notebook, I knew—you were right all along. I’m Kira.”

He winced, clenching his fists. Now that he wasn’t holding the notebook it felt like it should have been a lie, but there was no forgetting the surge of agony he’d felt. It was all true. He breathed out a long sigh, and the other Light faded a shade paler.

L’s frown, if possible, deepened. “I know,” he said. “I told you, I’m never wrong. But there’s something I don’t understand.” He stared up at Light, looking distinctly un-Ryuzaki-ish. “Light, why didn’t you kill me?”

Now Light frowned, feeling distinctly underwhelmed at the detective’s response, and opened his mouth to ramble vaguely, but was spared the embarrassment as L’s phone rang again.

Had the situation not been so dire, Light would have laughed at the absurd speed at which L’s face went from white to green, but in the moment, it was all he could do not to scream again at the horribly garbled voice on the other end of the line. _You’ll die,_ Light heard again, echoing around his brain. _You’ll die, you’ll die._ An awful shiver sped down his back. Whoever it was on the phone, they were speaking English, and the voice had been encrypted with several filters, which rendered it nearly unintelligible to Light’s ears, but L understood. He sank back into the loveseat, not seeming to notice that his smouldering cigarette had gone out between his fingers, and mouthed two words.

_The boys._

Light felt himself being grabbed roughly by the wrist, and suddenly L was dragging him towards the door, limping. He tore open a box and seized another cell phone, which he dialed with trembling fingers.

 _“Roger,”_ he choked out. More English. _“It’s me. You’ve got to get everyone out of the orphanage. They’re giving us forty-eight hours. Just keep them safe. I’ll be at Heathrow as soon as I can. I’ll explain when I arrive.”_

He wrenched the door open, revealing Wedy, blowing smoke rings on the balcony above the warehouse. She stopped dead at the look on L’s face.

“What’s going on?” she said.

“Get us a plane,” L said without preamble. “Whoever has the notebook—they’ve got Mello.”


	7. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> iT'S ABOUT TIME???

_The Earth is littered with the ruins of empires that believed they were eternal._

_—Camille Paglia_

* * *

All things considered, Light decided, he had definitely had better days. Collective hallucinations, flaming helicopters, gunshot wounds, and a kidnapping to top it off. Oh—and he was Kira. Out of all of these horrors, he only wished the world would slow down for a moment to let him process that last bit in particular, but the world, in fact, seemed intent on throwing as much incomprehensible information at him as possible.

“You’re saying that there are more of you,” he said, holding onto his seatbelt rather more tightly than he would have under normal circumstances. “How foolish of me, thinking that one L was a sufficient nemesis.”

“Precisely,” said L, who looked very pale. He had taken the backseat this time, and his fingers twisted against the fastening of his bandages. “But neither of them are—shall we say—ready yet. Upon my death, the most qualified candidate would— ”

“Upon your death,” Light echoed faintly. Wedy was watching him through the rearview mirror.

“Really, I didn’t want to think about it,” L said, and a shiver ran down the contour of his head towards his chest. “I’ve done awful things, Light, but the idea of handing my career over to a wide-eyed idealistic child who hero-worships me and my work is just...”

Light bit his tongue. _Sayu,_ he thought immediately. _She has no idea what I’ve done._ “There are two candidates,” said L. “One of them is quite like me. The other—Mello—is...devious, and loud. He’s the same age as your sister, Light.”

By now Light thought he should be used to L’s uncanny ability to voice exactly what he was thinking. The word _sister_ sent a twinge of fear through him, unbidden and sharp, so that he had to squeeze his eyes shut to rid himself of the feeling. But—this was interesting, all of this information; he wanted to know more. _Because you can use it to your advantage against him,_ said the other Light’s voice in some corner of his head. Light shoved it away.

“And there is a third, equally brilliant, but with no interest in succeeding me. I’m certain that if he worked as hard as Mello does, he would more than surpass him. He’s comfortable where he is.”

L smiled, and there was something bitter behind his eyes and in the quirk of his mouth.

“I care for them,” L said uncomfortably, as if even admitting this was causing him physical pain. “More than I can say. More than they know, I’m sure. I haven’t always been...attentive—”

Light was hit with a sudden surge of memories. All the times he had blown Sayu off to study in his room alone, had dismissed her and rolled his eyes at her and ignored her, had looked down on her and her friends...Sayu’s smiling face swam to the forefront of his mind, sliding in and out of focus like the view from a badly tuned microscope, and nausea washed over him. Sweet Sayu, oblivious to what he had done, oblivious to the catastrophic mess he was now tangled up in, oblivious to the fact that Soichiro could very well be lying dead on the interstate as she slept comfortably. Light thought of his mother, of his faraway bedroom and his house and the familiar floorboards where he would slide out of his shoes after school, the place where he had taken Sayu’s presence for granted for all those years. He tried to imagine Sayu kidnapped, and felt violently ill.

“I had meant to retire,” said L quietly, “if Kira didn’t get to me first. I wanted this to be my last case, no matter the outcome. I was selfish.”

Light couldn’t argue with that.

L looked straight at Light, despair on his face. “He’s so _young,”_ he said, and he couldn’t say anything more.

* * *

Mello did not speak English when he first arrived at Wammy’s House. He communicated through wild-swung fists and scraping fingernails, through bruised shins and slick red knuckles, until Roger would lift him kicking and screaming off of one of the other children and drag him up the porch. After the war, Eastern Europe was crawling with orphans. Some of the papers said Serbia; others Estonia; still others said he had been liberated from a trio of Siberian arms dealers using an orphanage as a front. He came with only the clothes on his back and his fist curled tightly around a black polished rosary.

There was a terrible hunger in the child’s eyes, a starved stormy fierceness that neat haircuts and regular square meals could not allay. But there was also a great sadness, L thought when he first saw the photograph. Looking straight at him, straight into those black eyes, was unbearable. It was like looking in a mirror.

L talked to Mello’s chin, softly, in Russian first, never meeting his eyes for fear of seeing himself.

_Hello. May I sit here? I am Wammy’s nephew. You must be M._

He didn’t think Mello quite believed him, but then he supposed he was used to that.

* * *

Then there were whispered, frantic conversations in the dead of night.

_We can’t keep him in a room by himself. He won’t develop properly, locked away like that. We can’t afford to lose this one too._

_We can’t keep him in a room with someone else, either! Who could possibly tolerate him?_ A great pause. _Nobody comes to mind._

_Who knows what he could do...he needs to be supervised. Just remember the last time—_

_Enough!_

Silence for a long time.

_This isn’t a prison, Roger. The boy needs companionship._

_He—doesn’t—want—companionship! He’s a liability. Admit it. Your latest experiment has failed. Time to move on, and good riddance._

* * *

The solution arrived nearly two months later, as spring became summer. L watched the boy’s familiar blond head bobbing about in the heather from his third-story window. Mello chased larks around the misty moor, and swallows swooped at him from the tall grass. The boy would weave flower chains and twist stems into wreaths, leave bunches of meadowsweet in his boots, tuck nightshade into the floorboards at the foot of his—

Someone was sitting on his bed.

Where Mello was slight, this child was heavy, sprawling, determined to take up as much space as possible; he kicked his stocking-feet idly against the bedframe as he hummed, his hands fiddling with some plastic contraption. Auburn curls bounced around the region of his face, and as Mello watched he gave a sort of halfhearted cough, then dragged one striped sleeve across the bottom of his nose.

Mello started forward to deal with him, his fists bared, but the child sat up, and something in his eyes stopped Mello dead in his tracks. Such bright eyes, Mello thought; such beautiful eyes. They were dusted with flecks of green and blue. Mello was mesmerised. He lowered his fists.

And then the child smiled, and held out his hand. “Mello?” he said. He gestured to himself. “Matt.”

* * *

“We’ll get him back, L,” Light said as they landed at Heathrow. It occurred to him that this was his first time leaving Japan. It was a shame about the circumstances.

* * *

Light was quite sure that L had taken a wrong turn somewhere. It had rained nonstop since they left London, and as they moved farther and farther from the glittering city the rain only worsened. Now nightfall was approaching, and as they drove on the light became—greener, Light supposed; more wild. Wedy glanced at him from the backseat and gave a long-suffering sigh in his direction. They had long since left Winchester proper and were speeding along a winding road lined with neat rows of little cottages, each one miniscule and ancient yet meticulously maintained. Blue siding, deep red siding with yellow trim, lilac-gray with white window ledges—faster and faster they went, until the countryside became a sort of green-gray blur; at the ancient stoplight they went left, and the houses were larger, yet more overgrown with ivy: massive dilapidated three- story confections that must have been the absolute picture of grandeur at the turn of the previous century. At the top of the hill there stood a courthouse, or a meetinghouse; Light wasn’t sure which. Its four great white columns were cracked and chipped, and above the archway, tarnished silver letters—several of which were missing—read _W... Commons_. Light murmured a soft “oh” as they rounded the corner onto a dirt path. Before them, laid out in front of the distant thunderstorm, stretched endless emerald fields. Light had never seen more green in one place. A heavy sort of mist was rising off the heather; Light followed its progress upwards until it became masses of towering thunderheads sliding in low over the horizon. The sun was disappearing in a golden blaze, staining the mist and dotting the fields with kaleidoscopic streaks of color. As they drove down the dirt road, masses of tiny glittering black birds scattered from the road and from the fields, wheeling overhead into a cyclone of feathers and beaks—“Starlings,” L said; Light watched them swoop into a writhing black tongue overhead. They sped past a tiny graveyard on the right; a magnificent willow stood at its edge, its bare branches quivering. Thunder boomed in the distance. Then out of the mist came a collection of towering brick and copper spires and slanting roofs and scalloped windows. A great bare sycamore stood just beyond the tall gates. L stopped the car.

“Quickly,” he said, and Wedy and Light followed him through the gates on foot, stumbling over pebbles and tussocks. The withered lawn was strewn with discarded playthings; dolls and wooden horses and miniature tea sets. The three of them climbed the porch; L frowned; the door was half open; he stepped through and kicked his worn shoes off as he entered.

Light took a deep breath. It had a peculiar old-house smell; there was an ancient woven rug at his feet and what looked like an even more ancient tapestry hanging to his left (Wedy whistled appreciatively, apparently finding it to her taste). Light examined a rusted barometer hanging on the other side of the entranceway, but L stepped straight through the first room and into a second, larger one, with a pair of sliding doors to a library at one end and a grand curving staircase at the other.

L beckoned them both closer in the dimness; Light winced as he stepped off the rug and immediately received a splinter from the wood floor.

“We’re not staying here,” he whispered. “I haven’t had word from Roger, but they seem to have gotten everyone out. I just need to collect some of my own files, and then we’re going back into town to regroup.”

Wedy looked dubious. “You have a plan?”

L opened his mouth and closed it again. “Yes,” he finally said. Light did not miss the tremor in his voice. “Light, come with me. Wedy—screening room, second shelf on the right.”

Three flights of stairs—a long, narrow hallway—L led Light to a closed door, at the very end of the hall, beyond which the faint light from the moor gleamed through a tiny circular window... they stepped into the room, and Light immediately sneezed, displacing several grayish dust motes; everything was coated in cobwebs, from the teacups stacked in precarious towering piles to the laptops and monitors lying scattered on the dusty carpet to the gray quilt and limp pillows atop a simple iron bed, which sagged under the weight of a multitude of encyclopedia volumes. There were magnificent deep velvet curtains hanging around a claw-footed wardrobe; strange silver instruments and keys and dead flowers and stray teaspoons and crumbs and faded photographs in tarnished pictureframes adorned the many shelves. Newspaper clippings and scrawled notes and police sketches and pages torn from books were tacked to the wall in a sort of layered, intricate collage; Light examined half of a story, dated several years previously, about a hospital fire in the Netherlands, and winced from the dead bees and wasps curled up on the circular windowsill.

“Watch your step,” L said, nimbly avoiding a collection of shattered china shards on the floor as he stepped past the curtains towards a massive cabinet.

“Your room,” Light said, thinking of his own immaculately clean one, then feeling another horrible twinge of sorrow for his family. “I can’t say I’m surprised.”

L didn’t answer, and instead rummaged through the cabinet, spilling papers and folders across the carpet as he searched.

“You don’t have a plan,” Light said. It wasn’t a question.

L surfaced, a dark, despairing look in his eyes that filled Light’s chest with icewater. He shuddered. “I do have a plan,” L said, standing up with a folded sheet of paper in his hands. Then, softly: “You won’t like it.”

Light frowned. “What did the people on the phone say?”

L didn’t answer.

“What did they say, L,” Light ground out. “What did they say when they told you he had been taken?” L turned away, started down the hall again. Light picked his way across L’s room, avoiding the broken teacups and trailing his hand along one of the shelves. Dread flooded him. His hand closed around a dusty sprig of dead heather. “L?” he shouted. “Tell me!”

They were both in the hall now, Light a stride behind L, when the door directly to their left swung open with a dusty sort of whisper. There was—a form there, beyond the entrance, crouching, with one hand on the doorknob. Light froze, flung out an arm to stop L from moving forwards. Whoever it was had heard everything.

The figure stepped out into the light, and L visibly relaxed. Light’s first impression was of a tiny ace pilot; the child wore a smallish tawny vest and was wearing a pair of overlarge goggles around his neck; his round face, pinched with fear, was nevertheless angry and alert—but upon glimpsing L, he gasped and ran to him; then, to Light’s intense shock, pulled him into a tight embrace.

“L,” the child sobbed, “You’re _here_ —they’ve got him—they have Mello—”

“Matt!” L said fiercely. “You shouldn’t be here!”

The sobs redoubled. “Roger told everyone to leave, but I snuck out—I couldn’t leave him, L; he’s my best friend—you’ve got to help me save him—”

L held Matt at arm’s length, looked him directly in the eyes. “That’s why we’re here, Matt, but you’ve got to join the others; you’re not safe here. We all have to get out—”

Matt took a long, shaky breath, and his eyes wandered over Light’s face. “Who is this?”

Light inclined his head, painfully aware of how utterly lost he must look. “Light,” he said quietly.

“I’m a—” Friend? Acquaintance? _Partner?_

“This is my assistant,” L said quickly. “He’s a detective, and a great one. We have got to leave, Light; we’re wasting time. Matt, come with us for now. We’ll collect Wedy and head into town.”

The look in his eyes distinctly said _I wish Watari were here_ , but the moment he turned and marched down the stairs with Matt at his heels, it was gone.

 _I do have a plan,_ L’s voice echoed in his head. _You won’t like it._

 _Wouldn’t be the first time,_ Light thought, and he sighed and followed in L’s wake once more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wammy's house never had too much embellishment in the manga or in the anime, so I took what little information we had from those sources and ran with it. The fields, the starlings, the buildings, and the surrounding countryside is mostly based on my own wonderfully gothic, lovecraftian college, which is only as creepy as it is in this chapter during certain november evenings.  
> Also: the next chapter is already written; i'll be posting it sooner than you think. 8)


	8. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> People talk; Light has a (bad) plan.

_Alien they seemed to be;_

_No mortal eye could see_

_The intimate welding of their later history,_

_Or sign that they were bent_

_By paths coincident_

_On being anon twin halves of one august event…_  

_—Thomas Hardy_

* * *

_We have the boy Mihael. Come by yourself, to the place where you used to smoke between cases. You have forty-eight hours. Then we use the book._

* * *

Gunpowder. Chloroform.

Mello woke up in the dark. His hands and feet were bound, and his head felt peculiar—foggy, as if the gap between reality and his brain needed to be recalibrated. He was lying barefoot on corrugated metal, somewhere very damp and musty, with a pile of rags lying somewhere to his left. The binding over his eyes had come loose, but he still couldn’t see. There was blood drying in his hair—not his blood. Nothing felt injured.

He was alone.

Not for the first time. It was only a matter of time before everyone left. You get used to it, Mello thought. You get used to people leaving. All you have is yourself, time and time again.

Gunpowder.

Mello stirred.

No one would come. It was no concern of L’s whether he lived or died. _Second best,_ Mello reminded himself. L’s legacy was secure. Near was better suited to succeed him. If he wanted to live—and he did—he could only rely on himself. Anger burned in the pit of his stomach. It was up to him, just as it always had been. L was not coming.

Chloroform.

Very carefully, Mello dragged the bindings around his wrists across the most jagged place in the floor that he could find. He winced. The rope burned his wrists. He didn’t stop. Seams were beginning to split; the rope was wearing down. He bit his lip hard, tears springing to his eyes. His wrists were on fire, rubbed raw from the back-and-forth of the ropes. Blood began to ooze from the patches of flayed skin, and he nearly cried out.

The ropes snapped. Mello set to work on his ankles. He was utterly alone; he was still as trapped as ever. But now, he was unbound.

* * *

The motel was a far cry from L’s usual accommodations. Trains rattled by constantly, shaking dust and plaster from the ceiling. The rain persisted; the single window was damp and rotting. But the window gave way to a view of Parliament, its golden lights doubled in the churning river below. L himself was gone; Matt was asleep, which left just—

“I know you’re Kira, Yagami,” Wedy said unexpectedly. Light upended the flashlight he had been fixing and batteries rolled across the mottled carpet.

“What?”

“L told me. I’ve known since he brought Aiber and me on the case,” she continued, grinding her cigarette out into the motel coffee mug. “Told me you’d erased your own memories somehow, and as soon as you got them back, you would try and off the entire task force.”

Light’s throat felt suddenly very dry. “Oh,” was all he could manage. Some sort of long, drawn-out scream was taking place inside his skull. He knew it wasn’t real only because Matt didn’t wake up.

“Just between you and me,” she said wryly, sliding her sunglasses down her nose with one well-manicured finger, “I’ve probably done much worse.”

* * *

“Light, was it? You look awful.”

“Time difference,” Light managed, without looking up to see who it was. Matt got heavily out of bed and joined Light at the table, looking very much like he wanted to say something. Sayu had always fidgeted in the exact same way, with her fingers twisting together and her thumbs pressed against her palms. Light gave him a small smile, wary of how exhausted he must look.

“Please, don’t be afraid,” he said. “I’m just a friend of L’s.” The words felt false in his mouth. Matt smiled back at him, but it was too quick.

“What is it?” Light said. “You can ask me. It’s all right.”

“Who are you?” Matt said immediately. “I know you’re not a detective. L works alone.”

Light cringed internally. This child was the third smartest—or the one with the third most aptitude, if L was to be believed.

“I am a detective,” Light said. “He wasn’t lying.”

Matt sniffed slightly, dragging his sleeve under his nose. “A detective,” he said, “and what else?”

Light felt the blood drain from his face. “I don’t—I don’t understand what you mean.”

“L’s informants are all criminals,” Matt said. “You work with him. You know. That woman who came with you—I’ve seen her file. She’s extremely dangerous. But she must be good. L trusts her. And he trusts you...”

“Does he,” Light murmured, trying to imagine L actually trusting anyone.

“He must,” Matt said, “if he’s brought you this far. You know his identity and all, and he even brought you to Winchester...” He paused, and squinted at Light again as if seeing him for the first time.

“How _did_ you meet L?” he said, his eyes flickering from Light’s creased brow to his trembling mouth. _“No one_ meets L.”

Light took a deep breath. The longer he held off explaining, the worse he knew he would feel. Matt was staring up at him earnestly, and he felt a sudden urge to set the record straight. He thought once again of Sayu, and blinked rather harder than normal before letting his breath out and trying again.

“We—met on the case, and he ended up...things went south, and it was an emergency—he brought me along; he had no choice. He doesn’t trust me,” Light said bitterly. “And—by all accounts he shouldn’t. _I_ don’t even trust me...”

“You were a suspect,” Matt said quietly, staring up at Light with something close to reverence. Disgust clouded over his eyes, and he suddenly withdrew his hand from the table where Light had been resting his head in his arms. “He’s never wrong. Unless...”

His eyes found Light’s again, and Light watched him tremble ever so slightly as he opened his mouth.

“Kira,” Matt whispered.

Light felt white-hot self disgust bubble up in his throat and he wanted to curl up and disappear into the ground. So everyone knew. He bit his lip until blood burst in his mouth, and felt the sting of his fingernails on his palms from his clenched fists...shame billowed in him. He thought of Sayu’s smiling face and a palpable ache began in the region of his chest...he could feel his face crumpling like paper, could feel tears coming, and he wondered vaguely how long it would be until the crease between his eyebrows was permanent...he could never face Sayu again. Not after what he had done. And Matt—he cared for Matt, he realized then, cared what Matt thought of him—he had _never_ cared what anyone had thought of him before—

“Listen,” Matt breathed, and Light turned to face him in shock. “If you can get Mello back—if you’re as good as L said—I don’t care, all right, I don’t _care!”_

He shouted the last word, and flung his hand down on the table—next moment he was crying into Light’s shoulder and hugging Light around the middle...Light tentatively brushed his hair back from his face and cradled him as best he could in his arms. His sobs were subsiding, at least, and he surfaced with red streaming eyes and a quaking mouth; Light offered him a tissue from the cabinet, but he declined and wiped his nose with his grimy sleeve. Light nearly laughed then, thinking of Sayu. The ache worsened.

“I will get him back,” Light said. He felt hollow.

* * *

It certainly wasn’t out of a desire to save L, whatever this feeling was. He wanted it all to be over...for Kira to be over, for Mello to be safe, even though he hardly knew him; for Sayu and the rest of his family to be happy. The notebook, too—he wanted it destroyed, gone, erased from everyone’s memory...if only he could erase his own memories, like he must have done before...he no longer cared whether he lived or died. No, this was not out of a desire to save L. Not in the slightest. Not in the _slightest,_ he told himself again. How selfish could he possibly be, to want to destroy himself but have his loved ones remain happy? But how, then, could they be happy, he told himself, if they found out who he was? 

* * *

 

L came back around midday, soaking wet, clouds of stale tobacco wafting off of him.

L—he couldn’t have cared less. Matt and the others clearly looked up to him. _That_ was why he had to do it. He was _not_ trying to save L.

 _Selfish,_ said the other Light. He blinked the image away from behind his eyes, but the voice was still there, weighing on his chest, guiding him towards what he knew he was going to do. It certainly wasn’t bravery, either. It was necessary; that was all.

_Selfish._

_Selfish selfish selfish selfish selfish..._

* * *

“You can’t do this,” Light said.

“Do what?”

“I didn’t want to believe it,” Light said. “The great detective L—he would never risk his life, he would always find a way out. He would always take the easy way...and, believe it or not, I had admired that...”

L raised his head slightly, still not meeting Light’s eyes. “It’s our only choice,” he said, twisting his teabag string into a sort of half-noose.

Light felt a sensation akin to icewater wash over his midriff.

“You’re actually going to do it,” he said faintly. “You’re going to give yourself up.”

L set down the spent teabag. “I am saving Mello’s life,” he said. Measured, deliberate. His hands gave him away, shaking with quiet fear. “It’s our only choice,” he said again.

Light’s lips were parted, he noticed; he pressed his mouth into a thin line. “It’s not.”

“What?”

Before he realized what he had done, he was on his feet. L instinctively took a step back. “It’s not our only choice,” Light said. “How could you say such a thing— _you,_ L, of all people—?”

L’s gaze darted from Light’s face to the door and back again. Now he was staring at Light’s chin, as if he was afraid to meet his eyes properly.

“This isn’t martyrdom, it’s selfish! You’re _selfish,_ L, do you hear me? These children need you—they _love_ you, L, and if you deprive them of someone they love just because you’re too ashamed to face them when you can barely look in the mirror for self-disgust then—then what was it all for?” Light was on his feet now, shouting, his voice cracking, and he jabbed his finger at L’s chest. _“Selfish!”_ he shouted again, spit flying, and he was pleased to note that L looked genuinely frightened. “You—you selfish—”

Oh, but it felt _so good_ to raise his voice at him, to shout himself hoarse—there was something comfortably numb in the sheer loudness of it all, and the more the complexity of the situation settled in his brain the more he wanted to fade into numbness forever...he found himself grasping at air, reaching for the bedpost, and as his fingers found the cold iron bars he sank onto the filthy bedspread, wordless and winded at last. God, but he was _tired._ Never before had he wanted to give up so badly.

 _I need a favor,_ L had said, long ago, collapsed and weak on the bedspread. _I need you to be L for the day..._ and he had done it, hadn’t he...the thought appeared fully formed in his mind before he realized what it was, but in the next instant he had made up his mind. L would _not_ give himself up so easily.

L was shaking, colorless, his mouth partway open.

“Don’t you— _dare_ —call me—” was all he could manage at first. Light had never seen him so inarticulate.

"As long as I’m here, the orphanage will stay open—as long as I’m here, the system will perpetuate itself—they’re children, Light, and when you take a child away from everything they once thought to be constant—when you bring them up to forget who they are, they’re going to—they’re going to end up like _me,”_ he finished lamely, his voice breaking.

“People can change,” Light said, for his own benefit as much as L’s. L shook his head.

“It’s too late for me, Light. People like us—people like us can’t change. Not you, or me...Not Wedy or Watari or Aiber or Lind...maybe once I’m gone, they won’t all look up to me so ardently,” L said, casting a bitter glance at the motel windowsill.

“You can’t mean that,” Light whispered. “You can’t mean that, L...If I had a choice, I wouldn’t think twice...I’d do anything to make Kira disappear, I—I can’t—”

“This isn’t about you, Light,” L said, harshness creeping back into his voice.

“This isn’t about you, either,” Light said. “This is about Mello. Please don’t do this. You can’t—you can’t do this.”

“You can’t stop me,” L whispered. Their noses were nearly touching.

“I will still try,” Light shot back. He could have counted L’s eyelashes. L looked horrible, tired and wan and pale, and the shadows under his eyes had deepened to bruiselike smudges; his skin looked paper-thin, and Light could see all of the tiny blood vessels weaving about underneath...his foundation was caking off in layers, and he was shocked to see a dusting of freckles on his sharp nose and cheekbones. He imagined that he himself didn’t look much better.

 _“What,_ Light?” L said, and the moment was broken. “Because we slept together once and I’m fond of you? You don’t want this, I promise, I _mmfh—”_

Looking back on it, the timing was terrible for a second kiss, but there they were anyway, standing frozen in time, cracked lips brushing and hands tangled in hair. For a moment the shabby motel room disappeared and they were locked in a shaky embrace—Light wrapped his arms around L and L buried his face in Light’s chest, taking a long, shuddering breath.

Wedy would know where he had to go.

* * *

 _Heathrow,_ she had said, _there was a rooftop over a warehouse where he would always go to smoke_ ; it wasn’t such an odd request that people would question where he was going, and the kind cab driver accepted his wet wad of bills. Matt was fast asleep by the time he left, and L—well, when he woke up, he would find himself handcuffed to the bedpost...

It was only a natural retribution, Light supposed. He felt the key in his pocket, but didn’t dare take it out. He seemed to have gotten much worse at lying since the helicopter incident. He practiced what he would say. _L,_ he mouthed to himself. _I am L. I’ve come to collect the boy._

 _Convincing,_ he thought to himself rather proudly, and tried to stop himself from shivering too hard. That would rather ruin the effect.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I ended up rewriting this one about three times. Still not happy with it. I just want to move on lol


	9. Chapter 8

Freely we serve

Because we freely love, as in our will

To love or not; in this we stand or fall.

—John Milton

* * *

 

TOKYO

A model, a businessman, and a shinigami walked into a bar. The shinigami, of course, would not have done so if she had a choice, but she was bound to the man in the suit and was therefore obligated to follow him. The model, too, seemed to be having second thoughts, but she still carried herself proudly, stepping through the bar as if it was a runway and all the glinting shotglasses were camera flashes from adoring photographers.

“You’re closed,” said the businessman to the mystified bartender, sliding a stack of money across the bar. “Another ten thousand when we leave.”

The model fixed herself a lemon drop under the neon sign. She climbed into a barstool, crossed her black-lace legs, and took a small sip. Her lips left a black kiss mark on the glass.

“Everything’s gone well so far. Cheers,” said the businessman, pouring himself a drink. “Any evidence Higuchi might have left behind was obliterated. There’s no way to trace us to the physical kidnapping, either.”

“Right,” said the model. She did not drink.

“L is sufficiently distracted right now, I’d wager,” said the businessman. “Amane, you worked with him directly. You’re used to his tactics. You’re certain about all this?”

“L still wants me dead,” said the model, tracing one finger around the rim of her glass. She looked up at the shinigami, who nodded nearly imperceptibly. “He’s been right about Light and me all along. The media hasn’t given him enough credit. He’s suspected Light since the beginning.”

“You _told_ me that the L I talked to that day was Kira himself,” said the businessman. He frowned. “L wouldn’t dare expose himself to Kira so carelessly. You wouldn’t gain anything by lying. Especially not now.”

“I wasn’t,” said Amane. “I wanted to help you. I wanted to help Light. If I’d known everything you had planned…” She shuddered slightly.

“You do now,” the businessman replied, smiling coldly.

“I’m risking my life to be here,” Amane continued. “More importantly, I’m risking _Light’s_ life. You told me this would be worth it in the end. You said Light would be pleased with our plan. How can we be sure L will take the bait?”

“He’ll take the bait,” said the businessman, and offered no further explanation. “We want L alive, for now. After he directs us to the real Kira—” he leaned in conspiratorially, his smile lit up from below by the bar lights— “We will have no further use for him. And as soon as Kira starts killing again, he’ll have no need for us. I refuse to go down so easily.”

“We had a deal!” said Amane accusingly. “You said Light wouldn’t be harmed.” She jabbed one vivid red fingernail into his pinstriped chest. He winced. “Don’t forget, I’m still the second Kira.”

“The second Kira,” said the man, “with no notebook. You’re powerless without it.” He unbuttoned his pinstriped blazer and lifted one side of it slightly, as if he was raising a stage curtain. There was the book, tucked innocently into his innermost pocket. “I can easily replace you. Remember that.”

“You need my eyes,” said Amane sweetly, fishing the lemon slice out of her glass. “You can’t kill me. Not yet.” She pressed the cut lemon to her black lips.

“Enough,” cut in the shinigami. Clouds of white hair turned to silver and green, pink and indigo in the glow from the neon lights by the glass cabinet. She clicked her bony fingers. “Persons possessed by a shinigami,” she said, extending her skeletal arm towards the businessman, “suffer nothing but misfortune. I have vowed to protect Misa. I can offer no such protection to you. Remember your place.”

The businessman looked wary for a split second. “Just to be sure we’re all clear,” he said, clearing his throat, “No one is killing anyone yet. I fully intend to work alongside Kira. If we have to force him to comply, then we will. This will be beneficial for all of us.” He downed the rest of his glass. “I, for one, will not be caught in Kira’s crossfire.”

Amane sipped daintily at her lemon drop.

“If they don’t call back within the hour with confirmation that the boy is still alive and in custody,” said the businessman, standing up from his barstool, “I’m flying to Heathrow myself.”

“Misa. Are you sure about this?” the shinigami murmured once the businessman was out of earshot. She stooped low, bowing her skeletal head so it was level with Amane’s blond bangs. Joints cracked and popped; pale sinew stretched taut over bone.

“It’s all right, Rem,” Amane murmured. She delved into a hip pocket, removed a case of violet eyeshadow, and slid a tiny slip of paper out from the bottom compartment. “I’m not completely powerless.”

* * *

LONDON

Mello ran through the twilight. His wrists and ankles burned. He slipped on a broken bottle as he skidded into an alley and felt shards of glass slice the bottom of his bare foot open. The alley wall loomed up at him and he collided with bricks, scraping his knuckles, his forehead—he felt his skin tear open and he cried out and curled into a ball on the wet pavement, twisting his hands together, rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet. His hands were slick and bloody; his left foot mangled. He tried to catch his breath, but each inhale seemed to only further his panic. Somehow, oxygen was not flowing properly from his lungs to his brain. Tears streamed down his grimy face—not tears of sadness, or fear, but sheer, unadulterated pain.

L was not coming.

Breaths were coming easier now. He pressed one hand to the bottom of his foot, trying to stem the bloodflow. Immediately, a switch flipped in his head. L was not coming. That was fine. Mello could take care of himself. He tore a scrap of fabric off the bottom of his shirt and started to clean up some of the blood.

He felt a pang of sadness for Matt, then a twinge of anger for Near. None of it mattered now. He was on his own.

He remembered an ordinary day of classes; he remembered men with briefcases; he remembered a whiff of chloroform and then the cluttered trunk of a long black automobile and then nothingness for a while. 

The streetlamps flickered on. The sickly orange was comforting, almost. Mello breathed in the city air, breathed it out.

_I will make my own way._

* * *

L woke up feeling surprisingly well-rested. Then he remembered.

His hand was cuffed to the metal bedframe. _How amateur,_ was his first thought, _not like Light at all,_ but none of that mattered now; the cuff wasn’t a physical restraint as much as it was a mental reminder. “Wedy,” he called out. There was no response. His voice didn’t seem to be working. He coughed. “Wedy,” he tried again.

She looked over from the hotel desk, where she was showing Matt how to load a pistol. “Welcome back, kinky bastard,” she said. “Need help with that?”

L gave her his best withering look. She produced a key from somewhere and unlocked the handcuffs. He joined Matt and Wedy at the desk, resting his forehead in his hands. Just under four hours left.

“You let him go,” L said. Wedy looked at him very seriously.

“Yes, I did,” she said. “He’s extremely capable, L. Have a little faith, for once.”

“No time for faith,” L said. “We _cannot_ allow him to turn himself in. Wedy, I expected—”

“Please,” Wedy said, exasperatedly setting down the pistol. “I put a GPS tracker in his shoe. I know exactly where he is.” She flicked her lighter open and calmly lit a cigarette. “How are you holding up?” she said, tilting her head slightly to get a better look at Matt, who seemed to be shivering.

“Can I have one of those?” he said, pointing to the pack of cigarettes on the desk. Neither L or Wedy had the chance to respond. The laptop on the desk lit up, and a familiar face, surrounded by clouds of pale white hair, swam into view before them.

“Near?” L said, trying to gather his supposedly ample wits. Matt abandoned Wedy’s cigarettes and leaned forward in his chair to get a better look. “What is it?”

“I’m with Watari,” said Near. His face was remarkably calm, but his voice betrayed him, trembling slightly as he spoke. “We got separated from the rest. He’s been trying to contact you for days. Soichiro Yagami is in critical condition. None of his officers have left his side.”

L felt his heart leap into his throat. He forced himself to wrap his mind around Near’s words.

“But there’s something else,” said Near. He moved aside. Watari himself leaned in, looking very pale.

“It seems Mello has escaped his captors,” he said, and L was so relieved to see his face, lined and familiar, that he barely processed this pronouncement.

“Excuse me?” said Wedy.

L shook himself. He shoved all thoughts of the potentially-dying Chief from his mind. “When did this happen?” he said. “Where is he now?”

“According to our tracking device,” Watari said, consulting the bottom of his screen, “just under twenty minutes ago he was approaching Myatts Field North. We can attempt to triangulate his location from here, but with our available technology, we won’t be able to retrieve him…”

“We’re stranded at Heathrow,” piped up Near, looking shaken. Watari gently draped his coat around Near’s shoulders. He began to fiddle furiously with the topmost button, turning it over and over in his fingers.

“We can get him,” Matt said. “We can do it.”

Wedy, L, Watari, and Near all looked at him, mystified. Matt curled his gloved hands into fists. “He’s my best friend. If there’s even the slightest chance of getting him back, I’ve got to try. Let me see the laptop.”

L nodded. “What do you have in mind?”

* * *

Sirens screamed. They sped along the freeway in the stolen police car, Wedy weaving through traffic, Matt typing furiously at the laptop in the backseat. Night was falling over Brixton. The sky was a haze of indigo; rows of shabby tenements were lit up unevenly, like books on a crooked shelf.

“Found him,” Matt said. “Take the next exit. I’ll handle the traffic lights.” Wedy abruptly swerved the police car onto the exit ramp. L clung to the seatbelt, feeling sick.

Light. Mello. Light. Mello. Light or Mello. _No,_ L thought, _do not think like that._ Mello, and then Light. _Wedy let him go. Surely she knew what he was planning to do…_

L sighed, and massaged the bridge of his nose. He felt as if he had aged ten years or so within the last four days, and vaguely wondered whether he looked as tired as he felt. Behind him, Matt surfaced from his frenzied typing, grinning widely. Every stoplight within visible range had gone green. “Nicely done,” said Wedy, and floored the accelerator.

L’s chest ached. Was this really what it felt like to be in love? To feel so incomplete, so hollow, that it was like dying? A year ago—was it really a year?—he would never have imagined _caring_ so much. To kill, to die for someone—these were foreign to him. And to have Light Yagami—to have _Kira—_ put L’s life ahead of his own…

_I would die for you._

L watched the city go by.

_I would kill for you._

L reached into his pocket, slid the tiny scrap of paper between two fingers. _Yes,_ he thought. _I can kill for Light Yagami._

* * *

TOKYO

A businessman walked out of a bar. He was beginning to worry. His contacts in London had not updated him on the kidnapping situation in over an hour. Every hour on the hour, they had said. Sooner, if there were unintended developments. Something had clearly gone wrong. The shinigami floated behind him like a ghost. A chill shook his pinstriped shoulders. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone to make a call. Before he could flip it open, it rang. He checked the ID.

“Yes?”

“Namikawa,” the voice on the line said.

“Speaking.”

“It’s urgent. The boy escaped.”

Namikawa cursed under his breath. He sensed the shinigami tilting its white head behind him. “How?”

“It’s all right,” said the voice quickly, with nothing short of much-suppressed excitement. “You’ll never believe who showed up instead.”

**Author's Note:**

> title taken from Nabokov's Laughter in the Dark (although don't expect any of **those** themes to show up here...maybe if you really, really squint). this is my first fic on ao3 and I hope you enjoy it. I haven't written fanfiction since high school wtf....


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